Anxiety, Overthinking, and Overwhelm: Buddhist Hacks For Changing Your Mind | Joseph Goldstein

Simple practices for not believing everything you think, becoming less reactive, and handling whatever life throws at you. Joseph Goldstein https://www.dharma.org/teacher/joseph-goldstein/ is a cofounder of the Insight Meditation Society https://www.dharma.org/ and the Barre Center for Buddhist Studies https://www.buddhistinquiry.org/, both in Barre, Massachusetts. He is the author of many books including, most recently, Dreamscapes of the Mind http://give.dharma.org/JGpoetry. In this episode we talk about: Why your thoughts have so much power over you — and how to take it back A surprisingly funny technique for dealing with self-judgment Why trying to get rid of an unwanted thought often makes it worse The difference between recognizing an emotion and actually being mindful of it Why sadness and unhappiness aren't the same thing And much more Get the 10% with Dan Harris app here https://app.danharris.com/membership Sign up for Dan's free newsletter 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 To advertise on the show, contact [email protected] or visit https://advertising.libsyn.com/10HappierwithDanHarris

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

• 0:04Dan Harris?

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

• 0:18Dan Harris?

  Hello, everybody. How we doing? This is an episode for overthinkers, warriors, the anxious, basically everybody. In this conversation, I talk to my longtime friend and meditation teacher Joseph Goldstein about some time-tested hacks he has for overthinking, anxiety, overwhelm, and the like. For those of you unfamiliar with Joseph, he is the co-founder of the legendary Retreat Center, the Insight Meditation Society. He's also written such books as One Dharma and Mindfulness. This episode is part of an occasional series we've been running with Joseph where I interview him about the various teaching phrases he uses. Let me explain what I mean by that. Joseph likes to teach using pithy little mottos, Buddhist earworms that

• 1:02Dan Harris?

  weasel their way into your brain and surface just at the moment when you need the most. These are incredibly helpful little mantras that I use all the time in my own life. And by the way, the eventual goal of these interviews is to turn them all into a book, a collection of Joseph's phrases. So this is a great episode. You're gonna love it. Speaking of Joseph, by the way, you can learn from the man himself in his outstanding seven-module meditation masterclass over on my newish meditation app, 10% with Dan Harris. From sensations to thoughts and emotions, this series gives you all the tools to build a practice, choose a focus, or simply begin again. In addition to Joseph's meditation masterclass, the app also includes

• 1:46Dan Harris?

  a growing library of meditations from a bunch of world-class teachers, ad-free access to this podcast, exclusive livestream events every week with me and my many amazing meditation teacher friends. And one of the coolest things about it is we've got a robust, supportive, nonjudgmental series of discussion threads where you can ask questions, share tips and struggles, and connect with our team and one another. There is a free 14-day trial, if you want to try before you buy. Check it out at danharris.com. We'll get started with Joseph Goldstein right after this.

• 2:19Dan Harris?

  Most of us can remember being about 15 and feeling completely invisible, or worse, extremely visible, but for the wrong reasons. I remember one year when I was a teenager, I had a pimple in the crevice of my nose for the entire year. I didn't like that. Either way, even if we have painful memories of that age, most of us tend to soften it in memory, and it was actually harder than we remember it now. That is the territory of Carrie, now streaming on Prime Video, the first-ever television adaptation of Stephen King's Carrie. Eight episodes from Mike Flanagan, with Stephen King as an executive producer. Flanagan had described the show as a tragedy. It's about a girl who doesn't feel seen by

• 3:03Dan Harris?

  anyone, and about how small, everyday acts of unkindness compound into something nobody meant to cause, which happens now at a speed and scale that would have been unimaginable not long ago. What I really appreciate about the show is that the show takes Carrie seriously as a person rather than as some sort of symbol. And the season keeps circling around one major question: are you watching the making of a hero, a villain, or something more complicated than either of those options? Carrie is now streaming on Prime Video.

• 3:42Dan Harris?

  Hello again, Joseph. All right, so I have compiled a bunch of phrases that I think, and it's possible that I'm, you'll have to correct me, that I'm misusing the phrases, but I think these phrases all have to do with a noxious trio of overthinking, overwhelm, and anxiety. And I've put the overthinking phrases, I've front-loaded those. So one that has been really helpful for me, and this is, I think I've heard you use it specifically as a meditation instruction, but I think in my own life, I've used it off the cushion, and it is up and out.

• 4:18Speaker 01

  So there's an interesting backstory to this phrase, as there is with almost all of them, because they came out of kind of the lived experience of trying to put all this into practice. So this goes back to my early practice days in India. So I was quite young, my twenties, really getting into long-term intensive meditation in India. After the beginning period, when my mind had really settled and was kind of in the flow, all of these ridiculous memories started flooding my mind, like reseeing old TV shows

• 5:00Speaker 01

  that I had seen as a kid, like Father Knows Best, which you're probably too young to even know of that.

• 5:07Dan Harris?

  I've heard of it.

• 5:08Speaker 01

  It was just, you know, one of these early boy sitcoms. And the fact that they were still in my mind, unbeknownst to me, you know, those memories, but in the course of sitting, they just started coming and coming and coming. And there were a lot of things like that, when the mind gets a little more calm and collected and mindful and concentrated and all that. And still, it seems like it opens the door to the emergence of all of these memories, images, thoughts, you know, that we've been carrying around, have been carried in the mind over all these years. And some of them were just so ridiculous.

• 5:54Speaker 01

  Why are these coming up to the mind? You know, but that's when I began to get the sense, oh, yeah, it's all in there. And now I really have the belief that everything we've ever experienced is stored somehow in this mystery called memory, which is kind of a mystery, how all that works. But it's all in there. And when we make the space, it just all starts coming up. And that's what up and out, because over time, it felt like a cleansing in a certain way. So they came, came, came, and then they stopped coming,

• 6:36Speaker 01

  you know, and then some other memories. So it was like that. And that feeling of allowing things to come up, be with them, be mindful, and out. Sometimes it's about very unimportant things like reruns of Father Knows Best. But sometimes it can be, you know, even difficult memories, or sometimes even traumatic memories, you know, that come up with practice. And over time, if we can develop a kind of equanimity in being with them and seeing them, it deconditions the power they have in the mind, because we're learning to see them without reactivity.

• 7:16Speaker 01

  So that's another example. Okay, up and out. I've found that over these many years, it really has freed the mind from a lot of these situations in the past that were difficult, or some kind of emotional struggle involved. And in having them come up in the meditation and being with them in an equanimous way, again, it was up and out. And I think that's what creates that sense of more space in the mind, and more ease and more freedom.

• 7:49Dan Harris?

  The way I have used it until now, it may be a somewhat limited deployment of the phrase, but when I'm bird-dogged by particularly persistent thoughts that are no longer useful, I'm just, it's just a rehash. Up and out. Up and out.

• 8:07Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 8:08Dan Harris?

  It's not hostile. It's just like, let's move it along, kids.

• 8:11Speaker 01

  Yes. Yes. No, it's a phrase that can both suggest to us, but also reflect what's happening. That is a way of letting go. It's just a way of letting go of whatever attachment or identification with them was there that keeps them lodged in. So I think it could be used to describe on a lot of different levels how that process happens.

• 8:37Dan Harris?

  It seems key to me, this is an error I've made many times, it seems key to me not to have a creeping aversion.

• 8:47Speaker 01

  Absolutely. There's one principle, and I think in meditation and in life, that when we have aversion to something, it's actually feeding it. It's strengthening it. And so not only is aversion itself an unwholesome mind state, it's also counterproductive in terms of relating to whatever it is that we have aversion to. It's actually strengthening our connection to it in that negative way. But I think often, we don't see that, you know, if we have aversion to something, yeah, I want to get rid of this. I wish this would

• 9:29Speaker 01

  go away. And all the time, we're feeding it. So it's really interesting to watch that.

• 9:36Dan Harris?

  How do we make sure we're not feeding it?

• 9:39Speaker 01

  Well, through mindfulness and equanimity. We have aversion to things because in one way or another, we feel them as being unpleasant. We generally don't have aversion to pleasant things. So as we've spoken in previous episodes of discussions, vedana, or the feeling tone, when we're not mindful of it. Conditions reactivity. So pleasant conditions, desire. Unpleasant conditions, aversion. So if we can be equanimous with the unpleasant feeling of whatever it is,

• 10:24Speaker 01

  then we're with it, but without aversion. And that's how the mind stays free and more effective in seeing, okay, well, what's the best response here without off-feeding it?

• 10:36Dan Harris?

  Just a feeling you're refreshing on Vedana. In the Buddhist view, everything that arises in the mind, everything you notice, or even the things you don't notice, physical sensations, thoughts, et cetera, has a so-called feeling tone, a kind of valence to it. It's either pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral. So we either want it, don't want it, or we don't care. And aversion arises when the feeling tone is unpleasant. Often, our thoughts, especially when we're overthinking, are unpleasant. And we maybe tend to use a phrase like up and out with hostility. You're saying one way to not have this process backfire with some unseen aversion is to be mindful

• 11:19Dan Harris?

  of the feeling tone and the underlying thought process in this case. I often find that I'm using up and out to kind of usher things along when I feel like I've already processed it. I've already sat with my ancient resentment of the bullies in seventh grade. And I don't need to run through a big process of being mindful of it, investigating its feeling tone. This is more like, oh, I know what that tape is. I'm just gonna kind of pleasantly move things along. Am I saying all of this correctly?

• 11:53Speaker 01

  Yes, except for one thing that I'll clarify.

• 11:55Dan Harris?

  Please.

• 11:56Speaker 01

  No, that's basically it. And so then you're really using that phrase as just, in a way, an acknowledgement of what's happening.

• 12:04Dan Harris?

  Yeah.

• 12:05Speaker 01

  You're not using it to have it happen. You're just noticing, oh, yeah, this is what's going on. This is coming up and out, which I think is, can be helpful because it reinforces the understanding that that kind of awareness will result in that letting go of it. Just the one slight refinement about Vedana or the feeling tone. Sometimes people may think that the quality of pleasant or unpleasant inherits in the object. But the feeling tone reflects how we're experiencing the object.

• 12:48Speaker 01

  So two different people may experience the same thing. One may find it unpleasant, another may find it neutral.

• 12:55Dan Harris?

  Yes.

• 12:55Speaker 01

  Or perhaps in some cases, even pleasant.

• 12:57Dan Harris?

  Yes.

• 12:59Speaker 01

  So that's an important distinction because in some way, it's giving us agency in the process of working with it, of realizing that even on that basic level of how it's experienced as being pleasant and unpleasant is a result of our own conditioning. It's not about the object itself. Does that seem clear?

• 13:24Dan Harris?

  It does seem clear, yes. Let's step back and say you have a bunch of phrases that are really helpful for overthinking. But let's just step back for a second and talk about a phrase that I feel is more descriptive of thinking generally. And this is a phrase that you actually referenced in one of our earlier episodes in this series on the phrases. And it is tiny dictators. Can you talk a little bit about that one?

• 13:47Speaker 01

  Just to clarify, I use the phrase little dictator.

• 13:49Dan Harris?

  Oh, little dictator. Okay, my bad.

• 13:53Speaker 01

  Little dictators of the mind.

• 13:55Dan Harris?

  Just want the listener to note how often you have to correct me. I don't know who they're gonna feel bad for, you or me?

• 14:04Speaker 01

  So what was the question about this phrase?

• 14:06Dan Harris?

  Just the derivation and what you mean by little dictators.

• 14:12Speaker 01

  The phrase came to mind when I realized that when we are really investigating the nature of thought as a phenomenon, and this is what we've talked about, we see that little more than nothing. And yet, when we look at our lives, I look at my life, when I'm not seeing thought in that way, it's like all these thoughts will come. This is an example that goes way back, but it shows the point. I remember one time I was teaching. This is when the Europa University was first starting in Colorado, this new Buddhist college and university. So I was teaching there in the opening summer sessions.

• 14:55Speaker 01

  And I had a little apartment that they were housing me in. And I remember one evening, I'm just sitting comfortably in my apartment, and the thought comes, oh, pizza would be nice. And it's like the thought lifted me up, took me out the door downtown to get a pizza, started eating it, burned my mouth. So it just went on. Where did all that come from? It came from that one little thought, which in itself was a little more than nothing. And that's a trivial example of what happens so, so often in the course of a day.

• 15:39Speaker 01

  And so the contrast between seeing it's essentially empty nature when we are aware of that, and how much power thoughts have in our lives when we're not aware and we don't have the space in that moment to discern, is this worth going for? Do I really want the pizza? So it's not to say we should never act on our thoughts because of course we do and we need to. But most of the time, it's automatic. Being not mindful of thoughts gives them this tremendous power in our lives. And as we are aware, it just opens up a lot of space for wise discernment.

• 16:24Dan Harris?

  I have a question before I ask you the question, just to insert. But if anybody heard Joseph say their empty nature in reference to thoughts, we have a bunch of episodes on what emptiness is, but very, very quickly, a sentence meaning in this case, empty of inherent substance. There is no, you can't find your thought. It's a mysterious little quantum burst of energy with no inherent substance, and it is not yours. By the way, there's also no you. Take out those other episodes if you want to hear about that. Anyway, my question is, how do we know which thoughts, which dictators to obey and which to organize a coup d'etat?

• 17:09Speaker 01

  Well, first to say that when we are in that mindful space, they're no longer dictators. We might think of them as suggestions because we're aware, oh, yeah, this is just a thought. Okay, is it helpful? Is it not helpful? So it's lost, it's lost its dictatorial powers. I mean, there are lots of frameworks by which, through which we can assess, you know, is this a good thing to do, not a good thing to do? A very basic one within the Buddhist context, the foundation of the meditative journey and really the foundation for wise living in general

• 17:53Speaker 01

  is framed in terms of the five precepts, five ethical precepts. And that's pretty fundamental in the Buddhist teachings. And just to reiterate what they are, it's refraining from killing and stealing and sexual misconduct and unskillful speech and taking intoxicants that just confuse the mind. So that's just a very broad framework in terms of ethical behavior that we can see, okay, is this action that's being proposed by a thought, is this in alignment with those precepts or not?

• 18:38Speaker 01

  That's one framework. Another framework could be just a very kind of ordinary assessment of if I act on this thought, will it actually be effective in achieving my aims? Because sometimes we may have ideas of what we'd like to accomplish. And a whole range of thoughts can arise about accomplishing them, but some may be effective and some not. It just gives space for this discernment, for this assessment. Another very general framework stems from the Buddhist understanding

• 19:22Speaker 01

  that wholesome and unwholesome actions, you could say wise or unwise actions, or skillful and unskillful actions can all be traced back to three roots. The three roots of unwholesome actions are greed, hatred, and delusion. So this is the Buddhist framework of understanding that. So that could be another assessment. Is this just more greed that this thought is? Or is it aversion? If it's delusion, we're probably too deluded to even know that it's delusion. And likewise, the wholesome, non-greed generosity

• 20:04Speaker 01

  and non-aversion hatred love, non-delusion is wisdom. So that, just having in mind, even in a general way, kind of in the background of our mind, do we check in with the motivation? You know, and the quality of the motivation? So there are many, there are many ways of assessing whether we should act on the thought or not.

• 20:27Dan Harris?

  That was very helpful. Nice job, Goldstein.

• 20:32Dan Harris?

  Just a teaser, we're not going to talk about this phrase now. You talked about evaluating the thought in terms of, does it help me with my goals, my aims? There is a great phrase to help one clarify one's goals and aims, but we're not going to do that now because we're going to stay with overthinking. What I have found to be a very useful tactic, strategy suggested by you for specifically with self criticism is to count the thoughts.

• 21:01Speaker 01

  Yes, I love this one. A very common pattern in people. And it comes up very clearly on meditation retreats, or even for oneself, just sitting at home. And if we're paying attention to our thoughts and the kind of thoughts that are arising, the judging mind is just so prevalent. It could be judgments of others, could be judgments of ourselves. Just as an example of this, again, I was on one retreat at IMS, you know, really being as mindful as I could, go into the dining room for lunch.

• 21:40Speaker 01

  And on this one day, I noticed that my mind had a comment about everyone I saw, about what they were wearing, how quickly they were moving, how much food they took from the lunch camp. It was ridiculous. And it was just this run. They weren't loud in my mind, kind of soft background thoughts, but it was ridiculous. So this is a little aside from the counting, which I'll get to. But what I found very effective in that regard, and it might be applicable in different life situations.

• 22:20Speaker 01

  When I saw just what my mind was doing, I started investigating, well, why are they coming? And I realized they were arising in the mind because I was seeing, in this case, all the other people, unmindfully, I was not mindful that I was seeing. So when I saw that, for a while, every time I went into the dining room, all I would note, seeing, seeing, seeing, from the time I walked in, getting the food, bringing it to the table, seeing, seeing. The judgments were gone.

• 23:00Speaker 01

  And it was such a good lesson in how we have to really practice being mindful at each of the sense stores. And for some reason, even in the way we teach, some reason we underplay being mindful of seeing. We talk a lot about hearing, body sensations and movement and thoughts. But actually seeing, for most people with working eyes, vision is the predominant sense field. We're wandering around in the field of what's being seen. And if we're not mindful, and we can observe this very clearly,

• 23:46Speaker 01

  we're continually reacting to what's being seen. I like it, I don't like it, judging, commenting. And it's all because we're simply not being mindful that we're seeing. So that in that situation was the antidote to all those judgments. But sometimes it's not from seeing. Sometimes we're just sitting with our eyes closed and all these judgments and often self judgments coming up. So at one point, when there was just a run of them, for whatever reason, I just started counting them. Judgment one, judgment two, judgment 538, judgment 10,000.

• 24:30Speaker 01

  And at a certain point, one just has to smile. One sees how ridiculous it is. And as soon as we can smile at them, they lose their power.

• 24:46Speaker 01

  If it goes back to what we're saying just before,

• 24:50Speaker 01

  those judgments are fed either because we believe them and are identified with them, or we have aversion to them, to the fact that they're arising. And it's pretty easy to understand, oh yeah, if I believe them and I identified with them, that's going to feed them. But often people don't realize that our aversion to them equally strengthens them. So that's why the sense of humor and the smile, that's just the magic key. But how to get to that place? I found the counting really helps because it just makes it so obvious how ridiculous it is.

• 25:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, so humor is a huge aid as we're watching our minds.

• 25:40Dan Harris?

  Well, here's a funny phrase along those lines. The thought of your mother is not your mother.

• 25:45Speaker 01

  Yes, yes. There was something my teacher, Manijji, would say very often to remind us, it's just a thought. But we invest so much in the thoughts when we're not seeing that it's just a thought.

• 26:03Speaker 01

  And again, I want to reiterate, I'm not suggesting that thoughts aren't useful. Thoughts can be a powerful force in our lives for the good. I mean, people have gotten enlightened just hearing certain teachings, which is a thought process. The hearing teachings, we're understanding them through our thoughts. They can be a direct pointing to the deepest truths. So it's to be clear, I'm not suggesting that that they don't have value. We just have to be a little more discerning. And that discernment only comes when we're aware that we're thinking. So it's all a package.

• 26:49Dan Harris?

  Does the phrase painted tiger feel apropos?

• 26:53Speaker 01

  Probably. So it's apropos, particularly with regard to the thought of your mother is not your mother. It's a thought. So there's a Zen story, it's probably apocryphal, but it's a good story. It's about this Zen monk living up in the mounds in a cave, and he was a great artist. And for whatever reason, he was using painting as his practice. So he's up there in the mounds in his cave, years, painting this tiger on the wall of the cave. And he was a really good artist and he spent all this time.

• 27:34Speaker 01

  And so by the end of it, he looked at the tiger, the painted tiger, and got frightened.

• 27:42Speaker 01

  And so a good mental note with regard to thoughts might be painted tiger. There was no tiger there, it was just a painting. Whatever we're thinking about is not the thing itself, it's just a thought. And so I find that just, again, another slightly humorous way of reminding ourselves not to simply believe every thought that comes into the mind. Because many of them, they're all painted tigers in some way, because they're not the thing itself. But particularly with thoughts that are not helpful.

• 28:27Speaker 01

  But for whatever reason, we're believing them, the painted tiger.

• 28:32Dan Harris?

  So there's some phrases here that I have found provide perspective in the face of overthinking or rumination. One of them is consider your sila. Is that line for you?

• 28:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, so I was, this was a time when I was in Burma for a couple, two, three months. Tensive practice with Saya Upandita, and my practice was just in the doldrums.

• 29:01Dan Harris?

  Just to say Burma was home to a meditation master named Saya Upandita with whom you were studying.

• 29:07Speaker 01

  Yes, yes. And this is, I had already been practicing many, many years, but still there are always ups and downs in the course of the practice. That's normal. So I was just going through a phase of kind of the doldrums. I kept sitting and walking, but it didn't feel like anything was happening. So it wasn't so much being down on myself, it was just wondering, not that I'm putting in all this, you know, effort in intensive meditation, and it just felt flat. So after a few days of my reporting this, Saito Pandita said, "Reflect on your sila." And sila here means ethical behavior.

• 29:51Speaker 01

  So my first reaction when he said that, "Oh no, did I do something wrong?" That was my very first reaction. I came to realize that he was saying it as a way of encouraging the mind, if we reflect on our sila and realize, "I've been practicing ethical behavior" as a way of uplifting the mind and encouraging the heart. The principle here in a way is sometimes reflecting on one's wholesome activities, you know, and wholesome actions, skillful actions. People might think, "Oh, that's just an ego trip,"

• 30:33Speaker 01

  which, then in the wrong way, could be. But that kind of wise reflection on, "Yeah, that's, you know, I've been doing something wholesome here. Been doing something skillful, beneficial." That's not an ego trip. That's reinforcing faith. It's reinforcing wisdom. It's reinforcing kind of an appreciation for the value of the path and what we've been doing. So that's really what contemplate your sila was about, as a way of uplifting the heart.

• 31:09Dan Harris?

  Well, let's talk about whether this is applicable to a regular person who's not in the middle of meditation retreat. You know, contemplating your sila. Some of us might be fraught because maybe we are not living in alignment. However, I could also imagine it in the way I've used it, to the extent that I've used it, is a kind of cousin to gratitude to, yeah, I spend a lot of time reflecting on my terrible behavior or flaws. But let me just take a second to think about, "Oh yeah, you know, if I think back at this, yeah, on this very day, I did a, you know, a bunch of..."

• 31:42Speaker 01

  Good things.

• 31:42Dan Harris?

  Yeah.

• 31:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, so there's an interesting connection here to the loving kindness practice. Because it's said that the condition or the cause for metta, loving kindness, to arise, both towards other people and towards ourselves, is appreciating the good qualities in others and in ourselves. And when we think of that and contemplate that, there's a natural, almost spontaneous, friendly feeling that arises. And it's very instructive to see how often with other people and with ourselves, we don't focus on the good qualities.

• 32:27Speaker 01

  We focus on what we don't like. We focus on the bad qualities. And just realizing would be helpful to see that pattern. And the way of coming out of it would be, just as you said, but to use it as a way of appreciating the good qualities in ourselves, appreciating the good qualities in others. And it changes, it changes the dial.

• 32:50Dan Harris?

  Here's another phrase that I think is perhaps more center of the bullseye that can jar you out of a state of rumination and kind of give you some perspective. It's not, fill in the blank.

• 33:03Speaker 01

  Yes. This is something I've used forever. But especially, especially after I began teaching and working with people. And I extended it from just applying in my own practice as a teaching tool. If people are struggling with some difficulty and really caught up in the struggle and they don't, they don't have perspective on it. So I'll use a reference to whatever current situation is happening at that time. And so for a long time, I would say, "It's not Bosnia. It's not the Sudan.

• 33:47Speaker 01

  It's not Gaza." You know, and just reminding people of the situations where the suffering was a much, much, much greater magnitude than our little struggle. Now, that has to be used also wisely. Because if people are really involved in something, for example, that's deeply traumatic, that would not be inappropriate to you. Because it might feel like those situations because of the intensity of the suffering. So this is useful for more mundane,

• 34:29Speaker 01

  run-of-the-mill suffering entanglements, catching about one thing or another.

• 34:38Dan Harris?

  Catching for the non-Jewish or non-Jewish adjacent is Yiddish for complaining. A phrase that was used a lot on me when I was a boy.

• 34:49Speaker 02

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• 35:21Dan Harris?

  This expression that I'm going to propose to you next feels really apropos to me. The wisdom of the non-toothache. So to my understanding is the wisdom of the non-toothache is, can you appreciate when things are going well? When you don't have a toothache? To me, that can put my obsessive thoughts into perspective. Does that make sense?

• 35:43Speaker 01

  Yes, it does make sense. And you've expressed it perfectly. It's actually right in line with some teachings right from the Satipatthana Sutta, the discourse on the foundations of mindfulness. So the Buddha actually addressed it directly, but not using toothache as an example. But in the Third Foundation of Mindfulness, which is mindfulness of the mind, one of the categories is, be mindful when, for example, the hindrances, one of the hindrances, like desire, aversion, restlessness. Be mindful when they're present.

• 36:26Speaker 01

  Be mindful when they're not present. And it's interesting that it's much harder to remember to be mindful when they're not present. Because when they are present, they make themselves known, you know, with a lot of fanfare. When they're not present, there's nothing strikingly obvious about it unless we pay attention, you know? And so that emphasis on being mindful when things are going well, when the mind is calm, when the mind is peaceful, when there's not a lot of suffering or any in the mind at that particular time. As you said, to acknowledge that is really helpful.

• 37:11Speaker 01

  And we have many more moments of that in the day than we realize. So again, it's encouraging to be including the non-toothache in our field of awareness.

• 37:25Dan Harris?

  Here's another phrase that I've heard you use that is quite useful when one is caught in a, like, a thought storm, which can, you know, can last, these can last years, really. And I remember the first time you used it with me, I was a little pissed off because I didn't really understand what you were saying. I remember we were standing on a street corner in New York. It's very early in our friendship. And I was just describing the fact that my wife and I were in the middle of a long infertility struggle. And you were very sympathetic. You did not dismiss it at all. But toward the end of the discussion, you said, "If it's not one thing, it's another."

• 38:07Dan Harris?

  And I didn't really take it in the spirit in which it was intended, but it's something I've thought about a lot since then. So what do you mean by that phrase?

• 38:18Speaker 01

  That phrase relates to another phrase, which explains it perfectly. The other phrase is what I think is a fantastic expression of the first noble truth of the Buddhist teachings, like core foundational teachings of the Buddha. And this is across all, almost all Buddhist traditions, are the teachings on the Four Noble Truths. The truth of suffering, dukkha in Pali, the cause of suffering, which is craving, the end of suffering, which is coming to the end of craving,

• 39:03Speaker 01

  and then the noble Eightfold Path, which is the way to accomplish this aim. So that first noble truth, the truth of dukkha.

• 39:14Speaker 01

  The definition of dukkha that I came across, and I thought was just so brilliantly succinct, that dukkha is the inevitability of unwanted experiences. And I think that's something everyone can relate to in their lives. There is no one who goes through life free of unwanted experiences. At times, they are inevitable. So that's really what, if it's not one thing, it's another. If it's not one unwanted experience, there's going to be another one. Because they are inevitable

• 39:58Speaker 01

  in this conditioned world. And I love that because it normalizes the fact that it happens and that it will happen inevitably. So it's not a mistake that they're happening. And so, once we see it in that broader perspective, I think it helps us have a perspective on what the particular unwanted experience is. And if we have a broader perspective, I think we can better see how to address it. Is there something I can do about it? Is there not? What would be the right course of action? So all of that can be considered. But that's very different than thinking it's a mistake

• 40:44Speaker 01

  or getting worked up with a lot of aversion to the fact that it's happening. Because we think it shouldn't be happening. So another example of this, and again, this touches into a basic teachings of the Buddha. And we may have talked about this a little bit before, I'm not sure. The Buddha suggested certain reflections on the inevitability of unwanted experiences. The Buddha suggested that we reflect on this daily. And he said, "What has the nature to grow old will grow old, and I am not exempt.

• 41:29Speaker 01

  What has the nature to become ill will become ill, and I am not exempt. What has the nature to die will die, and I am not exempt." So what's interesting to me, as I reflected on this and have it come to mind, the first part was quite obvious. "What has the nature to grow old will grow old." It was the tagline of "I am not exempt", which even though, of course, intellectually, I knew that I am not exempt, I could often detect an underlying feeling,

• 42:13Speaker 01

  almost subliminal, "Well, I should be exempt", you know, of somehow framing it as, "Why is this happening to me?" So that "Why is it happening to me?" is a reflection of some hold into the idea that I should be exempt from what is this completely natural unfolding. And this is all about coming to realize the first noble truth.

• 42:45Dan Harris?

  So to me, these feel like a suite S U I T E of interrelated phrases when you're in, or when I'm in a woe-is-me state. So, "The inevitability of unwanted experience", this is just the truth of things. "Unwanted states are gonna happen. I am not exempt." I would just say as a sidebar, "And I am not exempt", the contemplation of your mortality is not a bad way to jar you out of overthinking. It's a great bolus of perspective. And then finally, "If it's not one thing, it's another", you know, we live, I have lived much of my life, and I still do this,

• 43:28Dan Harris?

  with the lie that if I could just solve this problem, or maybe this suite of problems, elision fields, like it's all good. But of course, there's gonna be another thing. And so, it just kinda just settle back into the situation with a little bit more sanity and patience. "Let me just deal with this problem, because I know there's gonna be something on the other side." And then I would add, I know I said "finally", I would add maybe one other phrase that we haven't discussed yet as the fourth in this little package. "Anything can happen anytime."

• 44:03Speaker 01

  Yes. It's all a package of phrases addressing this issue. So, do you want to hit a little backstory?

• 44:10Dan Harris?

  Please, please.

• 44:11Speaker 01

  This, again, goes back quite a few years. I was teaching a retreat for social and environmental activists at this wilderness retreat center in northern New Mexico. Beautiful place, Valle Cito's Mountain Refuge. Beautiful, in the middle of Carson National Forest, 9,000 feet alpine, stream running through it. It was beautiful. So during the retreat, and then on the last day, we did a hike on the very last day of the retreat. There was a small river running through the property. And so, we were hiking up along the small river and kind of scrambling over the rocks, you know, crossing back and forth.

• 44:55Speaker 01

  It was fantastic. On the way back, it had rained the night before, so some of the rocks were a little slippery. And walking back, I slipped on a rock and hyperextended my knee. And I knew something. An unwanted experience had just happened. Anyway, I make it back to the center. That evening, I was giving the Dharma talk. And I had the thought, "Oh, don't sit cross-legged. This won't be good." But I overrode the thought, I didn't listen to it, sat cross-legged. At the end, I couldn't get up. I had to be carried back to my room, which was very embarrassing.

• 45:35Speaker 01

  Because first, I'm 6'3", slung, I forget how exactly I was carried. Anyway, I'm carried back to my, that whole night, I had a busy summer schedule planned. And I just kept thinking, "How am I gonna manage this?" I couldn't even walk from the meditation hall to my room. So, a lot of thinking and worrying and anxiety. And then at a certain point, and it took most of the night to come to this, at some point, the thought came to my mind, "Anything can happen anytime", completely unexpected,

• 46:19Speaker 01

  with ramifications for how the rest of my summer was gonna unfold. "Anything can happen anytime." But surprisingly, some people might hear that and then might think that it leads to a kind of paranoid state. You're fearful, say, "Oh my God, anything can happen anytime. We have to be on the watch out." It was exactly the opposite. It was the acknowledgement of the truth of it. And it just led to this quality of acceptance in my mind. The inevitability of unwanted experiences. "Anything can happen anytime." So if we're aware of that and realize, yes, this is the truth of how things are,

• 47:01Speaker 01

  then when these things happen, we can deal with it with much more equipoise. We deal with it as best we can, but it's from a much more peaceful place of mind. And my mind did become peaceful. And then I just took care of it as best I could. Things were fun. This is an aside. Not only fine, so that I was scheduled to teach in Germany that summer. Anyway, managed to go with a lot of accommodation, you know, for my knee. Taught this course in Germany. At the end of the course, the dana basket, there were two of us.

• 47:43Speaker 01

  Some guy put in two $50,000 checks in the dana. He had just, he came from this super wealthy family. Parents had just died, I think. He had inherited this fortune. And I had had to think, "Oh, maybe I shouldn't go." So sometimes, "Anything can happen anytime can be on the good side as well." That was an amazing.

• 48:12Dan Harris?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 48:19Dan Harris?

  Just to reset, I think we started this conversation talking about dealing with overthinking specifically, and we're moving into an area that is inclusive of overthinking, but also of just how to navigate a complex, chaotic world more skillfully in the face of the non-negotiable truth of change, flux. There's another phrase that's coming to mind that I find really beautiful, and it comes directly from the Buddha, becoming otherwise.

• 48:52Speaker 01

  Yes. So I came across this phrase in the texts. And to reiterate just a point I made in a previous discussion, that I've been in the practice now of listening to the teachings rather than reading them. Because I must have read that phrase many, many times, and it didn't impact me. But when I heard it in the Buddha's description of change, of things always becoming otherwise, when I heard it, it really struck me in a completely new and vivid way, because it's a bit unusual in English. It's not a typical way we would

• 49:32Speaker 01

  talk of change and impermanence. And because of that, we could say, everything changes. And it's kind of flat. It's so obvious when we say it that way, that we don't really appreciate what it's saying. But things are always becoming otherwise, as a phrase, for me, made it very immediate, like in every moment, things are always becoming otherwise. I have found it to be a really good reminder at times. For example, I might be going for a walk,

• 50:12Speaker 01

  and then I have a little twitch in my knee or my back or something. Oh, becoming otherwise. So instead of, oh, no, what just happened? And do I have to do something? And all of that. Oh, just things becoming otherwise. So it reinforces our awareness that this is the nature of things. And again, it doesn't imply that in certain situations, we do want to do something about it. But it frees us from that reactivity of why me, which is really helpful, because even though we may not even articulate why me to ourselves,

• 50:54Speaker 01

  very often, we're thinking it silently. There's some flavor of it in our minds. And just things becoming otherwise, this is just the nature of things. So I find it very helpful and usefully pointed phrase to highlight that.

• 51:15Dan Harris?

  I found it really helpful in my relationship with my parents. I have a very clear visual of the first time, I think, that you met my parents. We were in the backyard of my childhood home. It was our first meeting to discuss launching a meditation app in like 2014 or something. And my parents were still living in my childhood home, and they were healthy and active. They were both academic physicians at Harvard. And really, for me, my whole life, the kind of my Alpha and Omega, I heard this beautiful phrase, not from you, there was some writer talking about some other important person in his or her life, and he or she said, they are the theater for my actions. Nothing felt real unless

• 52:00Dan Harris?

  my parents knew about it. And they're now living in an assisted living facility near me in suburban New York. And my mom's pretty sharp, but my dad is, he has become otherwise. He's still lovely, loving, I think, quite happy person. But he's had a lot of health problems, stroke, Parkinson's like diagnosis. And I felt so unmoored by their transition, and still do at times. But it's just things becoming otherwise.

• 52:27Speaker 01

  Yes. Yes. It's so interesting that, I don't know if resistance is the right word, or just delusion, that somehow with something so obviously true, that we don't take it in. We don't live as if it's true. So that's quite mysterious. And also, kind of a reason why the practice of mindfulness and awareness is so liberating, because we're just giving ourselves a framework for investigating what is so obviously true, that we have been overlooking.

• 53:10Dan Harris?

  True and painful at the same time.

• 53:12Speaker 01

  Yes. Although, in opening to the truth of it, some dimensions of the pain are eliminated, which is our reactivity and all.

• 53:22Dan Harris?

  Yes. I think I'm less resistant and more tuned in, more sad, the planguency of it.

• 53:29Speaker 01

  Yes. But for me, the emotion of sadness, there's a certain soft beauty to it, which distinguishes for me from unhappiness, that you can be sad and not unhappy. To me, that's just a useful understanding, because many situations in our life are sad, even when we realize their inevitability. That's fine. None of what we're talking about implies that we become emotionally flat. But there are certain emotions which are afflictive, which really cause us suffering, and are not particularly helpful. But other emotions,

• 54:11Speaker 01

  which may be acknowledging the same situation, are quite natural and even have a beauty to them.

• 54:19Dan Harris?

  The first time you said that to me, I did not like it, or I didn't get it. But it makes sense when you think about the term bittersweet. They've combined bitter and sweet for a reason. Where this leads me in my mind, in terms of having an ongoing flow in the conversation, as I'm sitting here feeling sad, talking about my parents, you have a phrase that's been very helpful for me with all kinds of emotions, whether they're afflictive or not. And this is going to sound simplistic, but it's not. And the phrase is, it's okay.

• 54:56Speaker 01

  As with many of the others, there is a story. There is a story. And I think the story will help to elucidate what that really means. So for many years earlier on in my practice, the strongest afflictive emotion was fear. So fear would just come up in so many different ways. But on some retreats, I was really practicing intensively, so things get magnified in that context. Fear would be coming up, and it would come up so strongly. There were times when I was afraid to go from sitting to standing. So it's completely

• 55:39Speaker 01

  irrational, completely. I mean, it doesn't make any sense at all. But somehow, that was the energy that was coming up for whatever reason. I have no idea why that was so strong. So it's just to say, I was working with this emotion over a long time, over many years, not at that intensity mostly, but was still there. So on one retreat, a couple of years after that intense experience, I was doing walking meditation, and I could feel different aspects of fear arising in the mind. And then something shifted in my

• 56:20Speaker 01

  mind. I could feel the shift, and it was expressed in the phrase, if this fear is here for the rest of my life, it's okay. It's okay. And I realized that that was the first moment in these years of practice, that I genuinely accepted it. And this points to another really important distinction in meditation, the difference between recognition and mindfulness. Because in all those years, I recognized what was there. I knew it was

• 57:00Speaker 01

  fear, and I could name it as fear. But it was always through the filter of not liking it and wanting it to go away, because it's a very unpleasant emotion. So I was looking at it through the filter of aversion, which, as we just discussed earlier, aversion feeds the very thing we're averse to. So unknowingly, I was keeping it going through my aversion to it, and through the delusion of thinking I was being mindful when I was not. I was just recognizing it. So in that moment, if this fear is here for the rest of my life, it's okay.

• 57:45Speaker 01

  In that acceptance, it was amazing. In that moment, in that shift, the whole ball, compacted ball of fear washed through. And just my heart relaxed. It's okay. And it's not to say that fear never comes again, because it does at times. But relationship to it is now completely different. When it arises, it's okay. It's okay to feel the fear. It's okay to feel unpleasantness. We don't have to default to aversion towards it. And in that acceptance, everything becomes more workable.

• 58:29Speaker 01

  And lighter, we're letting go of that strong identification with it. So it's okay has just, I call it the magic mantra. You know, it's okay. It's okay to feel it. And again, it doesn't mean that we never do anything in response to what may be happening. But when we're coming from the place of it's okay to feel it, then our response will be more effective, wiser, more skillful.

• 59:00Dan Harris?

  Right. Passivity is a misunderstanding.

• 59:03Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 59:03Dan Harris?

  This is about not being at war with reality first.

• 59:07Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 59:07Dan Harris?

  And then responding wisely.

• 59:09Speaker 01

  Yes. I like that. I like your phrase, at war with reality.

• 59:13Dan Harris?

  I stole it from somebody, I'm sure. But this phrase, it's okay, I think, reminds me of at least two other phrases that I've heard from you. Both of them, I think, are borrowed. One is borrowed from a poet and the other borrowed from your next door neighbor, Sharon Salzberg. The one from the poet, I think it's Robert Frost, is the only way out is through.

• 59:36Speaker 01

  I don't know where that comes from.

• 59:38Dan Harris?

  Oh, so you may have said.

• 59:39Speaker 01

  No, no, I'm sure that I read it someplace. Doesn't quite sound like Robert Frost, but maybe. I have, I have no idea.

• 59:48Dan Harris?

  I don't read poetry, other than yours. I don't read poetry.

• 59:51Speaker 01

  Anyway, it's a good phrase, whoever first coined it. So what's interesting is unpacking a little bit is what through means. The only way out is through. Because you could get through by bulldozing your way through, which may create its own problems. Or the way out is through, through a mindful acceptance of what's there, seeing its impermanent, empty nature. So that we're not contracting in response to it. We're staying with whatever it is in a balanced, mindful, aware, equanimous way.

• 1:00:32Speaker 01

  And then we do. That leads us through in a very skillful way.

• 1:00:38Dan Harris?

  Another phrase, the one from your next door neighbor is, well, I can say the phrase, I'll just have you tell the story and it'll, the phrase is the punchline. It hearkens back to our discussion of your struggles with fear. You were on a retreat with Sharon where it came up. You want to tell that story?

• 1:00:53Speaker 01

  Yeah. This was during those years when I was really working with it. And then not yet come to it's okay. So I was still trying to figure out, you know. We were teaching together in Texas. And after lunch, we were just going for a walk together and I was going on complaining about all this fear and, you know, because I was building a whole superstructure of self on top of this emotion.

• 1:01:19Dan Harris?

  This is the way I am. I will always be this way.

• 1:01:21Speaker 01

  Exactly. And so I was just going on and on about this. And at a certain point, Sharon turned to me and she said, Joseph, it's just a mind state. And, you know, sometimes it's just the right moment to hear something. That was one of those moments. Oh, right. This is just a mind state and I'm making up this whole big self story about it. And that really helped to reframe the whole thing. It's just a mind state. It was really helpful, just that reminder.

• 1:01:57Dan Harris?

  Well, I hear it not only as useful in terms of it maybe taking a few of the Jenga pieces out of the structure of self, the superstructure of self, but also the relief in knowing, yeah, this is a mind state and like everything else, it will pass.

• 1:02:13Speaker 01

  Yes, yes. That is how I heard it also. The meaning of it's just a mind state includes that.

• 1:02:21Dan Harris?

  Yeah. I want to get one phrase in because I kind of teased it earlier. It might be in the ballpark of a non sequitur, but earlier we were talking about how to, in the face of our constant flurry of thoughts, how to figure out which ones to listen to, which ones not to listen to. You said being mindful of them is really step number one. There's a phrase that has been helpful for me, once I'm mindful of my thoughts, to pick and choose a little bit more carefully. It's a lens, a pair of goggles that has been really helpful for me. And at first it sounded a little anodyne to me, but it actually has, as with many of these phrases, the more I've sat with it, the more meaning it has accumulated. And it is what matters most.

• 1:03:06Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm always interested as you give the buildup to the phrase. And I don't really know what phrase you're, you're leading to. So I'm always waiting with excited anticipation.

• 1:03:20Dan Harris?

  You know, and I'm always sitting here thinking, is he going to shake his head at me disapprovingly? And say, what are you talking about? Nothing to do with anything. Which has happened in the course of these recordings, just to say.

• 1:03:33Speaker 01

  So what's the first?

• 1:03:37Dan Harris?

  Are you asking that seriously? What?

• 1:03:42Dan Harris?

  The phrase is what matters most.

• 1:03:46Speaker 01

  I think the use of that phrase just really is a way of, just in the moment,

• 1:03:56Speaker 01

  stepping back from whatever the decision is that has to be made.

• 1:04:03Speaker 01

  And just taking a moment.

• 1:04:06Speaker 01

  And it can be quite intuitive. I don't think this requires a lot of thinking. I think we would know quite intuitively and quickly. If we take that moment to step back, does this really align with my values? Is this in alignment with what I value most? I think it's a very intuitive thing, but very illuminating. I think we know, you know, if we're about to do something and it's just really being motivated by greed. And it couldn't be a big greed, you know, it could be a little, a little greed. But often in the course of the day, we're kind of on autopilot.

• 1:04:48Speaker 01

  We're just going through the day, doing what we do, you know, reacting and doing this and that. And I think we often don't take the time to just have in the background of our minds, the framework of what is most important. You know, of what our values really are. So even occasionally, you know, to start with, if one could remember before doing something to ask that question can be really helpful. We've talked in earlier sessions about a right speech. You know, and some papalapa, the useless talk and, and all the other kinds of right and wrong speech.

• 1:05:31Speaker 01

  That's such a good, very simple arena. That was what I'm about to say. Does it really align with my values? Does it unite people or divide people? Just some very simple things. And as I say, it's not, I'm not suggesting that we spend 10 minutes trying to figure out our values and does this align or doesn't align. I think it's a much more intuitive process. That would come quite easily. If we just practice taking that moment to allow for it.

• 1:06:06Dan Harris?

  I agree. It is an intuitive process. I would only add that I have, especially when I'm working with my team and, and you know, I'm in the process of, you know, an early stage startup, it's very helpful in order to divine or discern your values, to ask the question, what matters most?

• 1:06:24Speaker 01

  Yes. And in that situation, there could be a whole process, a whole reflective process of actually sitting down and writing down. Okay. What are my values in this situation? There are ethical values or disservice values, compassion values, whatever they may be. Yes. So in certain situations, I agree that it could be helpful to expand it beyond that momentary intuitive sense to a real reflection and examination of what our values actually are.

• 1:07:04Dan Harris?

  Been a great conversation, in my view, on sort of, we started with overthinking and moved into sort of, how to manage an anxiety producing world and anxiety itself. Before we take a break, anything you feel like getting off your chest? Anything else coming to mind? He's looking at me and I can, I can read his mind. What he's thinking is, there are a lot of complaints about, I have about you, Harris, but they may not be relevant to this conversation. Am I reading you correctly?

• 1:07:30Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:07:30Dan Harris?

  No?

• 1:07:31Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:07:32Dan Harris?

  Okay.

• 1:07:32Speaker 01

  Not in the slightest. It wasn't even in the ballpark.

• 1:07:37Dan Harris?

  You had that mischievous look on your face.

• 1:07:39Speaker 01

  Yeah, no, but the, the look was, I was thinking of an example of that reflecting on values. So it may have been a little quizzical look. I wasn't sure whether it would be worth adding to it or not. So let's talk about that. Let's talk about your.

• 1:07:59Dan Harris?

  Now that I brought it up.

• 1:08:05Speaker 01

  I rarely have the thoughts that you have strived for me, just to know so you can relax.

• 1:08:13Speaker 01

  I mean, that just doesn't, it's not a strong pattern in my mind.

• 1:08:17Dan Harris?

  No, I know you met, even if I had been guessing correctly, I was guessing that you were gonna say it from a standpoint of humor.

• 1:08:24Speaker 01

  Yeah. Anyway, let me give that little example.

• 1:08:28Dan Harris?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:28Speaker 01

  As an example of a situation where reflecting on one's values could be really helpful, and it's something I suggested to this friend. He's in quite a senior position, you know, in a company and was thinking about the next step, possibly moving on to a different position. And there were a lot of pros and cons to the different opportunities that were presenting themselves to him, which involved, you know, perhaps moving or dealing with the schools for his kids, just a lot of, a lot of considerations.

• 1:09:08Speaker 01

  But there were situations which might have afforded him more, a higher position, something like that. So as we were talking, he was just talking it over with me and I suggested to him, you know, I think you and your wife together should sit down and just look at, okay, in your life now, what is it you most value? And then consider these different opportunities in the light of those values. Because I think it's very easy to become seduced by the glitter of some possible outcome

• 1:09:46Speaker 01

  and ignore other values that we might have. So I think it can be a really helpful way to navigate through life so that we, as much as possible, are doing things in alignment with what we value, rather than being caught up in, as I said, the glitter of some possibility and overlook them.

• 1:10:10Dan Harris?

  Yes, reverse engineer from the first thing.

• 1:10:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:10:18Dan Harris?

  Thank you so much to everybody who works so hard to make this show. 10% Happier is produced by Tara Anderson and Eleanor Vasili. 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 great indie rock band Islands wrote our theme. Also, one last thing before you go, remember to sign up for my new app, which is called 10% with Dan Harris. You can sign up over at danharris.com. On the app, you'll find a growing library of meditations from world-class teachers, ad-free access to the full expertise of our podcast guests, meaning you'll get this podcast with no ads, exclusive live stream events, which we do weekly, sometimes twice a week,

• 1:11:03Dan Harris?

  robust discussion threads to connect you with our team, with our teachers and with one another. There's a free 14-day trial if you want to try before you buy. Peace.

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