Sebene Selassie On How To Be "Non-Attached" When the Stakes Are High

How do you stay calm when the stakes are sky-high — like your kid's health, your partner's wellbeing, or the future of the planet? How do you face chronic pain without falling into self-pity? And how do you actually turn meditation from a good intention into a real habit? In this bonus episode, Dan sits down with the brilliant meditation teacher and author Sebene Selassie https://www.sebeneselassie.com/ for one of our weekly live sessions — a combo of guided meditation and audience Q&A that usually happens for subscribers over at DanHarris.com https://www.danharris.com/. We're sharing this one for free so you can get a taste. Together, Dan and Sebene dig into: Practicing non-attachment when life feels anything but abstract Meeting chronic pain and illness with compassion (without spiritual bypassing) The real psychology of habit formation — and why it's not your fault if you struggle to "just meditate" What the Buddhist teachings actually say about impermanence, rebirth, and the self You'll also hear a grounding 10-minute guided meditation, some laughter (including a cameo from Sebene's dog, Chacha), and a reminder that you don't have to do this practice alone. Join Dan live every Tuesday at 4pm ET for these weekly meditations and Q&As — plus access to all our guided meditations — by signing up at DanHarris.com https://www.danharris.com/. Related Episodes: Sebene Selassie On: Resiliency, Rewriting Your Patterns and Finding a Teacher Who Speaks to You https://www.danharris.com/p/sebene-selassie-on-resiliency-rewriting?r=4o5o&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false How To Handle Toxic Thoughts | Sebene Selassie and Jeff Warren https://www.danharris.com/p/how-to-handle-toxic-thoughts-sebene?r=4o5o&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false 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/! Tickets are now available for an intimate live event with Dan on November 23rd as part of the Troutbeck Luminary Series. Join the conversation, participate in a guided meditation, and ask your questions during the Q&A. Click here https://troutbeck.com/culture/luminaries-series-conversation-meditation-with-dan-harris-2025/ to buy your ticket! 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 To advertise on the show, contact [email protected] or visit https://advertising.libsyn.com/10HappierwithDanHarris Thanks to our sponsor: Airbnb: Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at airbnb.com/host http://airbnb.com/host.

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

• 0:04Dan Harris?

  It's the 10% Happier Podcast. I'm Dan Harris.

• 0:19Dan Harris?

  Happy Friday, everybody. Today, my friend, the great meditation teacher and author, Sebene Selassie, is here to help us tackle some thorny questions submitted by you. These questions include: How do you practice non-attachment when the stakes are high? The health of your kids, or your partner, or the fate of the planet? How do you deal with chronic pain and illness without falling into self-pity? And how do you actually make a meditation habit, instead of having it be just another healthy but unfulfilled intention? What you're about to hear is a recording of one of our weekly live meditation and Q&A sessions. We do these every Tuesday at 4:00 for subscribers over at danharris.com. We're dropping this one for free, so you can get a taste. It starts with a quick guided meditation,

• 1:02Dan Harris?

  and then we tackle the aforementioned questions and other questions as well. If you sign up at danharris.com, you can come to these sessions live every Tuesday at 4:00 Eastern. Our next one is on November 18th. It will feature our current Teacher of the Month, Kristiana Wolf. One more thing to say before we dive in here. If you want to meditate with me in person, I've got two events coming up. I'll be doing a live taping of this podcast in New York City on November 18th. It's going to be a conversation with the comedian Pete Holmes, who's not only very funny, but he's got a long and deep spiritual practice. This event will be a benefit for the New York Insight Meditation Center. And then, coming up on November 23rd, I'll do an intimate little meditation and Q&A sesh at a lovely little

• 1:43Dan Harris?

  hotel in the Hudson Valley called Trout Beck. There are links to both events in the show notes. Okay, we'll get started with Sebene Selassie right after this.

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• 2:49Dan Harris?

  Welcome to our Tuesday afternoon live meditation and Q and A session. And today it's with Sabine Selassie. Hi, Sab.

• 2:56Speaker 04

  Hey, Dan Harris. How you doing?

• 2:59Dan Harris?

  I'm doing great. Before we went live, you were saying that your dog, who has the amazing name of Cha Cha, Cha Cha Selassie, may bark or come on camera at some point, which I'm really, I'm rooting for both.

• 3:12Speaker 04

  It's likely to happen, so.

• 3:14Dan Harris?

  Okay, but as soon as I root for it, it won't happen.

• 3:16Speaker 04

  Well, you never know. I have a noise machine that is not on because, I mean, he'll bark at any little tiny sound in the hallway, so.

• 3:25Dan Harris?

  It's kind of like my inner critic.

• 3:28Speaker 04

  That's true. I should think of it like that.

• 3:31Dan Harris?

  You want to do some meditation?

• 3:33Speaker 04

  Yes, I want to continue with last time. We were just really grounding in the body because I don't know about everybody else, but these are intense times personally and collectively. And so that grounding and centering has been really helpful for me every day. So we're going to continue with that and really explore what it's like to be aware and allow whatever's in our awareness. So inviting you to find a comfortable way to be, sitting, standing, lying down.

• 4:08Speaker 04

  Just really allowing yourself to settle into the posture.

• 4:15Speaker 04

  I'm rolling my shoulders. You might want to just, you know, find your wiggle so that you can really settle in.

• 4:27Speaker 04

  Then you take a couple of deep breaths in and out.

• 4:40Speaker 04

  I want to begin with this not too well-known practice. It's a classical practice, though, called gladdening the mind, which is just a way to tend to our attitude as we, as we sit. Taught to me by a teacher of mine many years ago. And so the invitation is to just bring something, someone, some place

• 5:11Speaker 04

  to mind that makes you smile, you know, makes you really happy, just unconditionally. Sometimes I'll even go to my favorite LOL cat video that I recently saw or a meme, something that really brings a smile to your face. So just take a moment to tap into that and stick with one image or one memory.

• 5:48Speaker 04

  With that gladdening, see if you can get even a little more comfortable in your posture, making any adjustments so we can settle in for the next 10 minutes or so.

• 6:09Speaker 04

  Now resting your attention on the body.

• 6:16Speaker 04

  See if you can feel whatever is in contact with the earth or surface beneath you, whether that's your feet on the floor or your butt in a seat,

• 6:29Speaker 04

  your entire back on the floor, but really feeling that connection

• 6:36Speaker 04

  or grounding and centering. And so feeling that grounding as we gather our awareness on the body.

• 6:53Speaker 04

  Just noticing if you really feel sensation of that connection or if you're just vaguely aware of it and just take a moment again to really sense into that grounding. So sometimes I like to notice the difference between the right and the left side as a way to become more intimate with this experience.

• 7:16Speaker 04

  So is the left foot more in contact or maybe the left leg or butt feels heavier in a way or the right?

• 7:26Speaker 04

  There's nothing to change about this. Just noticing that sense of grounded connection, gravity working.

• 7:58Speaker 04

  If it feels good to maybe open the awareness to other sensations that are present.

• 8:07Speaker 04

  You can stay with this contact with the ground, what's underneath you, or you can start to maybe

• 8:16Speaker 04

  notice what's calling your attention.

• 8:29Speaker 04

  And as you're doing this,

• 8:32Speaker 04

  you may realize that you've been lost in thought and not connected to the body, and that's perfectly fine. It's actually expected.

• 8:44Speaker 04

  Then we'll get lost.

• 8:50Speaker 04

  But the body can become this anchor for centering our awareness.

• 9:00Speaker 04

  Just notice where you might feel vibration, tingling,

• 9:07Speaker 04

  pulsing, heat, cool.

• 9:12Speaker 04

  I feel air on the surface of my arms.

• 9:32Speaker 04

  And as we

• 9:35Speaker 04

  feel, sense, sensations,

• 9:41Speaker 04

  we're also learning to allow our experience. So

• 9:46Speaker 04

  some of these sensations might feel nice or pleasant, and some may not.

• 9:59Speaker 04

  But we create space and

• 10:03Speaker 04

  allow our experience. It's part of this training of mindfulness, of awareness without judgment.

• 10:20Speaker 04

  If anything is particularly painful or uncomfortable, please feel free to shift or move in ways that bring some ease, but also just notice what you can be with, too. I have a little bit of a pinch in my left hip, as I often do, and just kind of breathing into it, allowing that,

• 10:53Speaker 04

  bringing some spacious awareness and kindness to that.

• 11:25Speaker 04

  Again, if thoughts are arising, this is not a problem or a mistake, that this too can be part of awareness and allowing.

• 11:39Speaker 04

  Because thoughts are usually taking us into the future or the past or judgment, we come back to the body as an anchor in this practice.

• 11:52Speaker 04

  Just for these minutes, for this meditation period.

• 12:43Speaker 04

  The mind is particularly busy.

• 12:47Speaker 04

  I sometimes like to drop in questions. My favorite are, "What's happening right now?" And "Can I be with this? Can I allow this?"

• 13:57Speaker 04

  "What's happening right now?

• 14:02Speaker 04

  Can I allow this?"

• 14:09Speaker 04

  An itch, a grumbling stomach, a busy mind, an ache.

• 14:18Speaker 04

  Just being with what's here right now.

• 15:09Speaker 04

  We come to the end of this meditation, just taking a moment to appreciate yourself for showing up today, for making a little time for practice, for cultivating more spacious awareness in your life and carrying that out into the world.

• 15:30Speaker 04

  Welcome back, everyone. I have my bells, so ding.

• 15:34Dan Harris?

  Nice job, Teb. I was having to allow a lot of sleepiness, having nothing to do with the skill of your guidance and everything to do with, as we discussed before we started going live, that I've been doing this experiment with my psychiatrist recently of pulling me off of Zoloft. After 20 years, I've been on this very low dose of Zoloft to, allegedly to help me with panic. I'm not sure it was helping, so we're testing not being on it. Turns out, when you take yourself off of a drug you've been on for 20 years, it's intense. So I've been falling asleep a lot.

• 16:06Speaker 04

  Yeah. And is there like a time period, they say, that it takes to wean?

• 16:12Dan Harris?

  I want to get on the phone with my doctor, but I was asking my trusty LLM, you know, after 20 years, it could take a couple of months of brain fog. Anyway, great meditation. And we have a lot of questions that were sent in in advance, and there are also going to be questions here, down here, which I will keep an eye on. Is it okay with you if I start peppering you with some questions, Teb?

• 16:32Speaker 04

  Yeah, please.

• 16:33Dan Harris?

  Okay, cool. Okay, so there's a batch here on working with judgment. Christine Kelson says, "I'm wondering how to lean into the concept slash practice of non-attachment in high-stakes situations, particularly when they involve my children, my partner, the survival of our planet, et cetera. I would love to learn more about how to actually do this." What do you think?

• 16:57Speaker 04

  Well, I love how all your people ask really powerful, intense questions. They go like really deep. There's no shallow stuff. We're going straight to non-attachment. It's such a good question, and I really want to honor, like, it's a hard thing to do. What Christine brings up, you know, love for our families and friends and for the planet and for people everywhere who are really suffering right now. It's not something that we just want to kind of brush away, you know? That caring and that love is, we don't want to deny that. That's a powerful force that we want to honor. And I don't think Christine is saying that, but there's sometimes we just kind of want

• 17:41Speaker 04

  to get to the solution without honoring actually what's happening in our emotional life or what's coming up for us. So, yes, it's a beautiful thing to have that much care and love and affection for life itself. And what comes up for me is really recognizing the teaching of impermanence, so central to Buddhist philosophy and thought. And it's said purportedly that the Buddha said that recognizing and understanding impermanence, even for just, he says, the snap of a finger, it's more important than generosity. It's more important than the refuges, than metta, than the precept.

• 18:24Speaker 04

  You know, he's sort of exaggerating the importance of impermanence. So Christine is touching on a really powerful and important lesson here, that all things rise and pass away. And so that attachment we have is so central to being human. And our freedom is tied up with recognizing how attached we can get. So we're not denying the love, but we're recognizing that when we don't recognize that things, it's not even that we don't intellectually recognize it, but we're not really practiced with understanding that things are impermanent, including ourselves. And I know you've mentioned this before, Dan.

• 19:08Speaker 04

  Have you been practicing with the five remembrances? Am I getting that right? So this is a teaching that I used to chant in the morning for years. And it's such a powerful practice and it's basically recognizing if I don't chant it, I can't remember how it goes, but I'm of the nature to age. I have not gone beyond aging. I'm the nature to grow sick. I have not gone beyond sickness. I'm the nature to die. I have not gone beyond dying. All that is mine and beloved and pleasing will become otherwise, will become separated from me. And then it goes into this idea of karma, that I'm the owner of my karma. Everything I do for good or for ill, I will have a relationship to that in some way.

• 19:53Speaker 04

  It says, I will be the heir of that. And it's said that we have to recollect this daily. These are daily recollections. And it sounds kind of morose, you know, to remember all these things. But there's something actually really enlivening about it. I'm actually part of a sitting group on Wednesday mornings. We do the five remembrances together and then we discuss. And every week it's like a new insight comes. And one week I really realized like, oh, I always forget that it says my karma for good or for ill. You know, the good things we do are also our life and influence our aging and illness and death as well. Like they impact that and they impact the people we love.

• 20:36Speaker 04

  And so there's a way in which just coming to terms with the truth of life and death and arising and passing, that we do lose things allows us to have more capacity for love and appreciation for those things as well. But I'm curious, Dan, since you've been practicing with this, how it's been for you?

• 20:55Dan Harris?

  Let's see if this lends for you, you know, and reflecting back on Christine's question about, you know, having or being able to practice some degree of non-attachment in high-stakes situations. Our mutual friend, Joseph Goldstein, likes to quote T. S. Eliot, who talks about learning to care and not to care simultaneously. And for me, trying to keep in the forefront of my mind that everything's changing. I am incredibly impermanent. Everything is non-negotiablely impermanent. Allows me to care about what I'm focused on, whatever I consider to be high stakes, but also to understand that when the history of the universe is written, whatever I'm worried about right now is unlikely to show up.

• 21:39Dan Harris?

  So that's kind of how it nets out for me. Does that land for you?

• 21:43Speaker 04

  Yes, definitely. And it's really just, as the great philosopher Rob Base said, you know, joy and pain, like sunshine and rain. It's just truth, you know, that we, there's no getting out of the pain. That this practice doesn't suddenly make pain disappear. It allows us to experience that.

• 22:03Dan Harris?

  Yes.

• 22:04Speaker 04

  Fatioushness.

• 22:04Dan Harris?

  Yes. I think that for sure, you and Rob Base are unquestionably correct. As I think, or as I read Christine's question, she, I think, is thinking about like, okay, when I'm in the, engaged to something that to me matters a lot, whether it's in my own life, or you know, my partner or my kid, how do I, instead of hold like this, attached, how do I hold like this? And I think what we're saying here is reflecting upon the truth of impermanence can help you understand that it's okay to care, but it's also important not to care simultaneously.

• 22:48Dan Harris?

  Not in a nihilistic way, but in a helpfully paradoxical way.

• 22:52Speaker 04

  Yes, and that fourth remembrance, you know, all that is mine, beloved and pleasing, will become otherwise, will become separated from me. The truth, you know, whether we go, or someone else does, it's the truth of existence. And so having that, it actually allows for more affection and care.

• 23:12Dan Harris?

  Yes. Everything's shot through with a kind of poignancy.

• 23:15Speaker 04

  Yes, exactly.

• 23:18Dan Harris?

  Just to shout out a couple of people in the comments. Gail wrote that this is her first day as a paying subscriber. Welcome to you, Gail. Thank you for joining up. Douglas asked a question, harkening back to your, or made a point, harkening back to your meditation, Seb, around, you know, like, what's happening and can I be with it? And just pointing out that sleepiness is another thing that we, you know, so often have to learn how to be with. And I'll just say for myself, one of the things that I've learned, because I deal with a lot of both restlessness and sleepiness, is

• 23:50Dan Harris?

  Yeah, well, Joseph has sometimes encouraged me to try to be mindful of the sleepiness. And he says that's possible. I have not reached that attainment yet. But what I have learned how to do is just give myself permission to be sleepy. And honestly, it's tough. Sometimes I'm meditating in public, like in a situation like this, or I was at an event, the meditation party event we're gonna do in a couple of weeks. I will have flown back from somewhere the day before or actually that morning. And so I will have had to have taken a Klonopin, unfortunately, probably. And so I'll be sleepy while we're meditating and I'll just have to give myself permission to be that my torso can't deliver it over my lap midway.

• 24:30Dan Harris?

  And it's just like that kind of okayness scales, actually. It's like I can apply that in other aspects of my life. Again, back to Christine's question, like that's not attachment to me. It's like okayness with whatever's happening right now.

• 24:48Speaker 04

  Yeah. This idea that things should be a particular way, either inside of us or outside of us is really that contention with what is. And that, to me, the heart, heart, heart of the practice.

• 25:02Dan Harris?

  Yes. I guess there was some Zen master who was asked by a student, the student said something to the effect of, I've been listening to all your talks for years. Could you just whittle it down, please? Like, what is the Dharma all about? And the Zen teacher thought for a second and said, everything changes.

• 25:20Speaker 04

  Hmm, that's right. Yep.

• 25:23Dan Harris?

  Mike has a question on this subject. To what degree does responsibility relate to attachment? How to be responsible without being attached to an idea slash task slash person slash thought?

• 25:36Speaker 04

  I'm not quite sure if I understand the question because it might be attached to a particular situation.

• 25:44Speaker 04

  I don't necessarily see like an issue there, but.

• 25:48Dan Harris?

  I'm guessing that what he's asking is like, if I'm too non-attached, am I totally irresponsible as I move through life?

• 25:55Speaker 04

  Ah, I see. Yeah, well, that's what we were talking about. Like, we're not denying our love and care and affection. We aren't sort of indifferent. That's the near enemy of equanimity, right? Is it can look like we're have perspective and non-attachment, but we're actually indifferent to things. That's not what we're talking about. We're talking about a way of being that's recognizing the truth of human existence and then still showing up with a lot of love and care.

• 26:22Dan Harris?

  Yeah, yes. Kelly Rowland in the comments points out that not only is Rob Base one of our great modern philosophers, but also the 70s soft rock band REO Speedwagon, who have a line in one of their songs, "Hold on loosely," which I would a million percent agree with.

• 26:39Speaker 04

  Hi, Kelly. Nice to have you here.

• 26:41Dan Harris?

  There are some questions around practicing with health challenges. I think everybody knows Seb is too familiar with this. That's my editorializing.

• 26:49Speaker 04

  I am an overachiever.

• 26:50Dan Harris?

  You are an overachiever on the score. Okay, so Mary asks, "I would love to hear detailed discussions slash teachings around working with pain and chronic illness, as well as ongoing fear around illness. I know the last talk touched into this. I'm living proof that whatever doesn't kill you will make you slightly anxious for the rest of your life. I also have some difficulty feeling sympathetic joy for those who are having wonderful health and instead feel envy and some resentment, or just like a victim. Have been working hard with the Dharma to make a better relationship with physical hardship, but comparing mind and resistance often prevail. Any leads for other sources such as books or teachings would be appreciated. Thank you so much."

• 27:33Dan Harris?

  Seb, that's a pretty rich question. What, there's a lot of ways in which you could tackle it. What comes to mind for you as you hear me read it?

• 27:39Speaker 04

  I appreciate the question, Mary, and I'm sorry that you're challenged with that. I know it well, being challenged with pain and chronic illness. And last time, we spoke more about how to deal with it physically and maybe the release of emotions, which is still relevant here, but I'm hearing in Mary's question more like a question of an attitude towards it. And here, I think there's a lot of space for.

• 28:06Speaker 04

  As Pema Chodron said, feel your feelings, drop the story. I know for me, I can go straight into fix it mode. Like, I don't want to feel this judgment or envy or victimhood. And I haven't even really felt my feeling of grief a lot of times, or upset or sadness. So I think that is my go to first step is like, really feel my feelings without getting lost in like, that person didn't have that, or this person only eats McDonald's and they don't have cancer, or like, whatever, you know, whatever stories we may have about it, to really allow yourself to know what you're feeling, not the thoughts, but really your emotions. I think that's really important.

• 28:50Speaker 04

  And then I had a teacher, I think you've heard me talk about this before, Dan, who early in my cancer life, assigned me self-meta only. I think it was six months. Yeah, sometimes I think it was a year, but I think it was six months. And was so hard and so powerful. And that level of, okay, feeling your feelings and then really tending to them, having a lot of care and love for yourself. And this can lead into the self-compassion practices. Mary had asked for resources of, if you're not aware of Kristin Neff and EFF, I think her website is selfcompassion.org. There are so many resources there in meditations,

• 29:35Speaker 04

  and it's a really powerful, sort of three-step process of mindfulness, of, you know, really being aware of what's coming without judgment, what's there for you. And it sounds like Mary's aware of what's there. Recognizing the human condition of it all, that common humanity of suffering, many people, millions of people are diagnosed with cancer every year. So you're not alone in whatever you're experiencing. And then that self-kindness of really being kind to yourselves with whatever is coming up for you. And that's such a powerful practice. And it is a meditation that you can practice. I like to add a fourth step, which is the system stink. Because our world is not set up for

• 30:23Speaker 04

  Many of the challenges that we have, especially pain and chronic illness, really is hard to work the ways we need to move through the world, the ways we need to when we're ill. And I'm dealing with like a lot of bureaucracy right now with stuff that's up for me medically and insurance. I mean, it's like a ring of hell. So to just really extend that self compassion out to the context that you're in and what you're up against every day.

• 30:53Dan Harris?

  That's great. So there's a question in the comments and a question that was pre submitted that both seem of a piece. So I'm going to read them both and then get your take, Seb. In the comments in this live stream, Carrie says, I found myself consuming a lot of information about mindfulness, meditation, Buddhism, wellness, but find it hard to walk the walk. I'm feeling a little analysis paralysis. Can you speak to motivation or action to do this daily and incorporate it more into my life? And then Mary Ellen wrote something similar. She wrote, I'm relatively new to meditation. My thoughts are that I really believe in it. I went on a 10 day silent retreat in the Goenka tradition and loved it and learned from it.

• 31:35Dan Harris?

  And yet I can hardly get myself to sit ever in regular life. What's wrong with me? I felt the benefits during and immediately after my retreat. Why am I not embracing this?

• 31:46Speaker 04

  Yeah, such a good question, both of them, really good questions. And Mary Ellen, congratulations on doing a Goenka retreat. They're not easy. I was my very first retreat in 1997 and it's quite intense. So the fact that you did that is already a testament to your commitment to exploring this. Actually, my response to this comes from something I learned from one of your podcasts, Dan, with forgetting her last name, Gretchen.

• 32:16Dan Harris?

  Rubin.

• 32:16Speaker 04

  Gretchen Rubin has a book called The Four Tendencies. And that book blew my mind because she's basically talking about how we're motivated, whether we're internally motivated, externally motivated, internally and externally motivated, or neither.

• 32:33Speaker 04

  And a majority of people are externally motivated, which means that we won't do something unless there's sort of a responsibility to it. So we're not going to go to the gym unless there's a class that we show up and people are expecting us there. And, you know, we've made friends and so it becomes sort of a community thing. Or she describes two guys who go to the gym and at the end of every workout, they exchange sneakers.

• 33:00Speaker 04

  They have to show up and stay for the other one. And that's most of us. That's definitely me. If I have a responsibility or an obligation, I'm way more likely to do it than if it's just on me. I think you, Dan, I suspect that you're internally and externally motivated. It's the least common type and it's the people who are very disciplined. And whether the demand is coming from outside or inside, they do things. I call those people annoying.

• 33:30Dan Harris?

  Well, I just want to, I want to cop to being annoying in more ways than just that. But I definitely am that.

• 33:39Speaker 04

  Yeah. And so to not beat yourself up about the fact that when you were in a context with all these other meditators and a schedule and bells and all of these markers for how to practice instruction, that it was easy for you and then now you're home. And I don't know if Mary Ellen is internally motivated or externally motivated, but it's something to consider when we, in this culture of individualism and pull yourself up by your bootstraps and that kind of like self-made mythology, relying or taking refuge in community may seem like a weaker choice, but it's really all of these types.

• 34:21Speaker 04

  And I love that about the book, The Four Tendencies, have their pluses and minuses, their benefits and their drawbacks. And so to really acknowledge that it's a beautiful thing to also show up for other people as they show up for you. And that, that can create a really powerful sense of community and, and can deepen your practice, actually.

• 34:40Dan Harris?

  I posted a solo podcast at some point within the last year where I summed up everything I've learned about the science of motivation and habit formation based on the.

• 34:53Dan Harris?

  Dozens of interviews I've done on my podcast on this subject and maybe we can post it somewhere for people, but it's like a pretty succinct summary of the various strategies that I've encountered in doing this podcast for nine years or whatever around the gnarly topic of habit formation. But just a couple of things to say off the top of my dome here. One thing is if you're struggling with this, you're not alone and it's not your fault. What's the matter with me is a very common question, but actually it's not you, it's evolution. We are not wired for the easy adoption of habits. We're wired for short-term wins, like finding food, finding mates, avoiding danger. But creating a habit is a long-term game.

• 35:38Dan Harris?

  It's like an extended marshmallow test and this is not how we're wired. Just let that sink in before you get into kicking your own ass. Another thing to say is practically speaking, given that we're wired for short-term wins, starting small is incredibly helpful. So aiming for just a couple of minutes or one minute and being flexible about it, like doing one or two minutes daily-ish can be really helpful. And then finally, another strategy that can really help, and Seb alluded to this, is doing things as a group, the carpool lane effect, as I often refer to it. And that is the idea behind these weekly sits. And it's why we're toying with the idea, I'm not committing to anything yet.

• 36:21Dan Harris?

  Anybody on my team who's listening or watching this, don't strangle me. But there is a vision potentially in the future of having many more of these as a way to help people actually get over the hump and do the thing. Because for many of us, doing it in a group is a really powerful mechanism. I do want to just respond to some questions that I'm seeing in the Q and A here. Being human, that's the handle of somebody who asked a question in reference to Seb's reference to self-metta. N E T T A is loving kindness or friendliness. It's a style of meditation taught by the Buddha 2,600 years ago and practiced by Buddhists to this day, practicing.

• 37:03Dan Harris?

  The our innate capacity for benevolence, friendliness, good vibes. And one of the directions toward which you can apply meta is toward yourself. So self meta. So that's what Seb was told to do for six months to generate warmth and benevolence toward herself, especially in the middle of this health crisis. Okay, let's do one last question. Okay, this one's from Shelley. It says, I love Seb. Thank you for quote unquote, introducing her to me. I so appreciate you, Seb. I've learned a lot from you and find your influence to be grounding, inspiring and comforting. Question for Seb, I've really enjoyed hearing your thoughts on other lives and mystics, et cetera.

• 37:46Dan Harris?

  I've begun to delve into this territory, which I find utterly fascinating and sometimes confusing. I wonder if you would comment on how past and future ancestral generations fit with past and future lives. These two things seem potentially at tension with one another in the sense that our own karmic journey through time seems to suggest independence from ancestral linkages over generations. Can you help me to understand their connection? And then as an added layer, can you further help me to understand how not self or non self works alongside all of this? I know these are probably very hard questions and I'd be appreciative of any insight at all, however tentative it may be. I'm realizing as I read this question that you are gonna have to give us a 75 minute answer.

• 38:29Speaker 04

  24 hour lives.

• 38:33Speaker 04

  We're not gonna take any breaks. Yeah, that's a really big question. There's so many layers to it and I don't think, I'm sorry. Shelley, thank you for your very kind words about me, first of all, that's very generous of you. I will say, I wrote about this recently in my Substack, that there's so much, there's almost like a rabid rationalism in our world today in terms of unless things are scientifically verified and there's evidence and proof, like we're not gonna believe it. And the truth is, there's so much we don't understand. There's contemporary science that really can point to that, especially physics. And so. The truth of things like rebirth or reincarnation,

• 39:16Speaker 04

  which are central to the Buddhist teachings, are being studied. The University of Virginia, I think it's the Department of, I can't remember what their title is, but

• 39:26Dan Harris?

  Like actual something?

• 39:28Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 39:28Dan Harris?

  Actual studies.

• 39:29Speaker 04

  Department of Perception or something, yeah. But Jim B. Tucker is the main scholar who's written a number of books researching past lives of children because children are often ones who remember it. And it's fascinating. It's dry as dust because it's really scientific research, but it is, it's very interesting in terms of delving into the possibility that there's more to this life thing and how consciousness works and how it might pass through different lives or bodies. And then how then that relates to the fact that we're embodied people. And again, scientific research into intergenerational trauma or intergenerational resilience, like the not just physical DNA material

• 40:14Speaker 04

  that's passed down or genetic material, let's say, that's passed down as lived experience in our lives. And so we can sometimes be resistant to like, this sounds weird. I don't know about this, but there's actually a lot of growing evidence to the truth of these things. Now, how that breaks down in terms of how it relates to the Buddhist teachings and how it relates to not self, we're going to have to save that for the marathon life.

• 40:43Dan Harris?

  I think I've heard the answer as to the question, if there's no self, if the self is fundamentally an illusion, who gets reborn? I think what I've heard is it's the mind stream or the karmic stream that gets reborn, not some sort of little homunculus, little nugget of Seb that gets transmitted into the next life. And I'm not saying, hey, this is true, but this is just the Buddhist view on it. Am I in the neighborhood of accuracy here?

• 41:11Speaker 04

  Yeah, you know, I think that fifth remembrance kind of points to that too, that I am the heir of my karma, that I will be the heir of that is hinting towards that, right? That we have this karmic stream that comes with us. And that is unfathomable because if this is true, it precedes our physical life.

• 41:31Dan Harris?

  Yeah.

• 41:32Speaker 04

  Many causes and conditions for our existence.

• 41:36Dan Harris?

  Seb, thank you for doing this. I love you.

• 41:39Speaker 04

  No, thanks for having me. It was so fun. I love it.

• 41:43Dan Harris?

  Thanks to all of you for watching, joining us. Really appreciate all of you.

• 41:47Speaker 04

  Yeah, everyone.

• 41:50Dan Harris?

  Thanks again to Seb. Awesome to see her. Don't forget, if you sign up at danharth.com, you get guided meditations that come with all of our Monday, Wednesday episodes. They're crafted to help you pound the wisdom of those episodes into your neurons. And then you get invited to all of these weekly live meditation and Q and A sessions. The next one's coming up on the 18th at 4 Eastern with our current Teacher of the Month, Christiana Wolff. Also, just a plug for two live events I've got coming up. One on the 18th in NYC with the great comedian Pete Holmes, another on the 23rd up in the Hudson Valley at a hotel called Troutback. There are links in the show notes. Finally, thank you to everybody who worked so hard to make this show. Our producers are Tara Anderson and Eleanor Vassili. Our recording and engineering is handled by the great folks

• 42:35Dan Harris?

  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.

• 42:58Speaker 05

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