Good Inside with Dr. Becky - If You Think You're Bad at Meditation, Dan Harris Says You're Doing it Right.

Episode Date: March 12, 2024

Even if you don't consider yourself an anxious person, once you become a parent, it is easy to start worrying about the health and well-being of your child. But parents need to learn to manage their anxiety for themselves and their kids. To celebrate the 10th anniversary of his book, 10% Happier, Dan Harris joins Dr. Becky to dispel some of the myths about meditation and to show parents how meditation can be a practical strategy in their everyday lives.Join Good Inside Membership: https://bit.ly/3Izql3TFollow Dr. Becky on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drbeckyatgoodinsideSign up for our weekly email, Good Insider: https://www.goodinside.com/newsletterOrder Dr. Becky's book, Good Inside: A Guide to Becoming the Parent You Want to Be, at goodinside.com/book or wherever you order your books.For a full transcript of the episode, go to goodinside.com/podcastTo listen to Dr. Becky's TED Talk on repair visit https://www.ted.com/talks/becky_kennedy_the_single_most_important_parenting_strategyToday’s episode is brought to you by Garanimals: Garanimals is the original mix-and-match clothing brand for babies and toddlers in sizes newborn to 5T. Each Kid Pack contains carefully curated tops and bottoms that easily mix and match. Pick any top and any bottom, and voila! Instant outfit. And with up to a month’s worth of outfits in just one box, Garanimals’s Kid Packs take care of a whole lot of outfit planning. You can find all their fun mix-and-match styles from their new spring collection in Walmart stores and on Walmart.com. Today’s episode is brought to you by Airbnb: When you travel with kids, you get really good at expecting the unexpected. But Dr. Becky's last family vacation? She didn’t expect it to feel, well, like a vacation. She found an Airbnb with all these really personal touches—games for the kids, fresh coffee for her, and a really comfortable couch that she could sprawl out on and watch Netflix after the kids went to bed. The place reminded her a lot of home, and it made her realize that her place could also make the perfect Airbnb—and so could yours. We’ve put so much work into creating a loving, beautiful home for our families, whether it’s the kid’s playroom, a cozy reading corner, or even our favorite coffeemaker, and those same personal touches could also create the perfect getaway for another family. Plus, it’s an easy way to make some extra income for your next family trip. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at airbnb.com/host.

Anxiety. Even if you weren't someone who had anxiety growing up, it is so common for parents to find themselves feeling anxious, often. I'm Dr. Becky and this is Good Inside. And today on the pod, I have Dan Harris. Dan knows a thing or two about anxiety. In fact, he had a nationally televised panic attack while he was a news anchor on ABC. And since he's done a deep dive into anxiety and into the role meditation can play in helping manage anxiety and lead a happier life. He wrote the book 10% Happier 10 years ago,

and he has a very successful podcast, 10% Happier, that I was a guest on. I'm excited to be talking to Dan and to dispel some of the myths about meditation and to see how meditation can show up as a practical strategy in parents' everyday life. When you travel with kids, you get really good at expecting the unexpected. But my last family vacation, I didn't expect it to feel, well, like an actual vacation.

We found an Airbnb with all of these really personal touches, games for my kids, fresh coffee for me, and a really comfortable couch that I could sprawl out on and watch Netflix after my kids went to bed. The place reminded me a lot of home, and it made me realize that my place could also make the perfect Airbnb. And so could yours. We've all put so much work into creating a loving, beautiful home for our families. Whether it's our kids' playroom, a cozy reading corner, or even our favorite coffee maker, and those same personal touches could also create the perfect getaway for another family.

Plus, it's an easy way to make some extra income for your next family trip. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at airbnb.com slash host. Hi Dan. Hi. Good to see you. Likewise. So we were just reminiscing about our time at TED. That was such an amazing time. I remember I previewed my talk with you. We were like one of five people in the room. That's true. It was so good.

That talk was great. Thank you. And I think about, there was a thing you talk about not in the talk. I mean, the talk had a lot of influence on me. I remember seeing it not only in rehearsal, but also live. But then there's something that when you came on my podcast and you talked about MGI versus LGI, which is related to the subject of repair,

are you gonna have the most generous interpretation of the other person's action or the least generous? That has become a thing that my family and I talk about regularly. Well, I'm so glad that was impactful. I feel like like you, like like small, nuggetable, easy things that you can actually remember to use in real life. Anything that does not meet that standard.

I'm like, well, I'm just not going to remember it or use it. So. Especially, I mean, you're in a time, you've got three kids with 12, nine, six. Yes. And anybody who's in that space, asking them to, you know, imbibe like the entire polycanon from Buddhism or something like that.

It's just, it's just too much. The brain, the brain, most brains literally just can't handle it. We can only take in so much information. So I think these little nuggets are super helpful. And hopefully you just, you're hearing enough so that you remember it in key moments. That's right, that's right.

So speaking about the entire canon of Buddhism, I feel like that's not the brand of meditation that you necessarily put out there. I think that's what a lot of people think. And speaking about parenting and kids, you have a kid, I have three, it's so crazy. And it's a time of so much stress for parents and they feel so overwhelmed.

And I know sometimes when I talk to parents and I talk to them about the way they kind of know they need to focus on regulating themselves before they can even help their kid. And I'll bring up the word meditation and their reaction. I'm sure you see it. It's not like, yes, it's like, I can't do that. I'm not good at that.

So I love you to, I feel like you explain it in a way that feels so palpable and accessible and not like something in the clouds that I, you know, just don't have, you know, the time for. Well, I have a bunch of things to say about this. You'll have to cut me off if I get annoying. But I think there, I think there are, we can maybe taxonomize the different sources of resistance to meditation among parents. And I'm guessing, and I and I mean I'm this isn't a guess I I'm a person with a parents with a with a person with parents. Yes. I'm a person who is a parent also I

Think one of the big resources of resistance is I don't have fucking time for this. You know like I and I I think that's Super legit and so I'm not here to try to cut against the grain in any way. I think there are short daily or daily-ish doses that anybody can do no matter how busy you are. There are these little times in the day, we all have them that we're probably reverting to little ticks and habits that are not giving us much like doom-scrolling, for example, where you could fit in a minute or two minutes of meditation. So, that's just one thing. And on this subject of time starvation, there are just perfectly on-the-go type of practices that don't require any formal sitting or whatever that you can. And there are so many flavors of this that

we can talk about from just waking up and being mindful while you're doing the dishes, while you're walking between appointments, putting down the phone and just focusing on the raw data of your physical sensations of your legs moving or your hands moving through the water while you're washing dishes, changing diapers, whatever it is. There's just little moments where you can drop in, drop out of the wild stories in your head and into your body. And this can sound a little touchy-feely, but Bill Hader was on my show recently

and he said the most annoying thing about meditation is that the hippies were right. And so if you can drop out of the spinning stories and into your body just for a little snatch as a time during the day It makes a huge difference. I mean, I have a lot to say about this, but I'll just stop there Okay, well, I have so many things I want to actually ask you about that to go further But I actually want to rewind before we go there. So you weren't always into meditation It wasn't like your life story. Is that fair to say?

It's very fair to say. Okay. So can you share a little bit about like how you got there and how it related to your kind of struggles with anxiety? Yeah. I mean, anxiety's been, you know, a factory setting. I mean, the story that I've dined out on for nearly 20 years now is that I had a panic attack on television I used to be a news anchor. So I was on good morning America 20 years ago in 2004 and had a panic attack I mean, you can if you google panic attack on TV, it's like I think the first result

It's probably the most popular video I've ever made which is very embarrassing. Anyway, uh, so that happened people like raw truths People like I mean that is a raw truth Yeah, although you can say I mean like when I look at it now, and I've looked at it so many times I mean I was such a and I'm still like not emotionally that expressive. I mean talk to my wife about this you probably talk your offer for the next episode She's a great guest So she she would say I'm not emotionally expressive and you can see that in the videos like you can tell that I'm freaking out But I'm I hold it together reasonably well contained. Yes

um, and so the backstory there is that I had spent a lot of time post 9-11 as a young war correspondent and had that had been psychologically Challenging and then I had done some very dumb things in my personal life to compensate, including recreational drugs. Cocaine was a favorite. And I was not high when I had the panic attack. But later when I went to a psychiatrist, he pointed out that my intermittent drug use was enough to change my brain chemistry and make freaking out much more likely. So that panic attack led to me going to therapy for a long time and that led me to meditation. And as you indicated, it was not like on my dance card in any prominent way. I was raised by ex hippies and so they had made me do yoga and taken me to health

stores and go hiking and camping. And so I hated anything having to do with the new age or hippies. And so it was not something I ever considered. What changed my mind was that I started to see all of the research that shows that it's really good for you. This isn't like 2008, 2009, couple of years after the panic attack. In my job as a journalist, I started to see this research

that at the time was not well publicized. That suggests that like a little bit of meditation can rewire key parts of your brain lower your blood pressure boost your immune system It's quite powerful And it's also been shown to be quite good for anxiety and depression so I started doing it just a little bit every day and It started making a big difference for me and so that's the story of how I got into it And when you hear people say now and I imagine someone's listening thinking

Well, like I've never been good at meditation. Yeah, I hear that all those are my people. Those are your people. So okay, what do you want to say to those people? The thing, they have such good news on this score. The reason you think you're bad is actually proof that you're doing it right. Most people start meditating. They sit try to focus on one thing, usually it's the breath, and then their minds go wild. But the fact that you're seeing all of these distractions is proof that you're meditating correctly. Clearing your mind is impossible.

I always joke that it's, you know, the only people who can clear their mind are the enlightened and the dead. And so the whole goal in meditation is not to like stop thinking. That's impossible. Every eight year old tries that and sees you can't. The whole goal is just to notice, to try to focus for a little bit on one thing, like your breath or some other physical sensation. And then every time you get distracted, you start again and again and again. And that

waking up to distraction is meditation. That's not like a problem. That's not you doing it wrong. I was saying recently, or somebody was saying to me recently, when do you wake up from distraction? If you just say to the word in your head, say the word great, great. This is what is supposed to happen.

Why? Because the whole goal of meditation is to get familiar with the wildness of your mind. We have this inner conversation, which if we broadcast aloud, we'd be locked up, right? With this wild conversation of, I want this, I want that, I'm thinking about the past or the future, I'm judging people and judging myself,

you know, you know, planning a homicide, whatever it is, I just have all of these crazy thoughts. And when you don't see it, it owns you. And what meditation does is just get you familiar with your inner landscape and that familiarity is mindfulness. So if I'm sitting there and I'm thinking I have time for like a one minute meditation instead of doom scrolling and I'm doing something, I'm listening and then I notice, oh my goodness, I have to order fresh direct and oh my goodness, I forgot to sign my son up for soccer.

That's the point that you would say great. Great. I'd say great. Yeah. Because what I'm doing in that moment, tell me if I got this right, is I just noticed that my mind wandered. Yes.

And if I build the muscle of noticing when my mind wanders, then that muscle will probably activate in the moments I'm not meditating. Yes, and I'll just be in a little more control of my day. Is that right? Two things. One is you're changing the part of the brain that's associated with focus or attention regulation. The bicep curl of trying to focus on one thing, getting distracted, starting again, starting again, starting again. Rewires the parts of the frontal lobe that regulate our capacity to pay attention to be awake and aware right now,

which is the only time it ever is. That's one thing. The second thing is the more you notice how slippery the mind is and how it has these old grooves and habitual neuroses that keep popping up, the less owned you are by this ancient wiring, you know, and that you may have picked up from your parents and they picked up from their parents or you're picking up from noxious inputs from the culture.

And so that's the mindfulness part. It's a kind of self-awareness that allows you to see what's happening in your head without being owned by it. And that is just an incredibly powerful thing that's available to everybody. I'm thinking about even the relevance directly these moments with our kids, where let's say my six year old, I very clearly, I even connected him and I'm like,

okay, I'm gonna go to the kitchen, you're gonna clean up your room. And I come back and he didn't clean up his room. And it's so easy to go into like, oh, he doesn't respect me or has some like, you know, grant or he's gonna be a sociopath. He's never gonna listen to anyone. He's gonna be in jail.

But based on what you're saying, like the practice of mindfulness for a minute might increase my chances in that moment. It was kind of noticing, oh, like my mind just went to the future. And then I can probably respond from a more grounded place, not in my fear. Exactly. There's actually a word in Buddhism for what you're describing. So things happen, like your kid doesn't listen to you, or you stub your toe or whatever. And we have these

immediate reflexive habitual mental movies we make projecting into the future of all the terrible consequences. So the word for that in Buddhism is, this is an ancient word, propuncia. Propuncia, I'll say that. Propuncia. Yes. And it translates into the imperialistic tendency of mind, which basically is, it's an amazing phrase because something happens right now and then we colonize the future with our

phantasmagoric projections of what's gonna happen. And so if you have the self-awareness that's built up through meditation, boom, you catch in the moment, propuncia. That's what it is. I don't need to act on that. I can let it go and act on what's actually happening

right now. It's so funny, I call it the fast forward error. But that's right because then what happens, and I think this is one of the number one kind of quote errors we make as parents is we see something today, maybe my nine year old lied to me or I'm like, you know, I just saw you hit your brother and she's like, I didn't hit my brother. You know, I'm like, okay, right. And I fast forward to, she's going to be the teenager who lies. She's going to get involved in drugs and not going know about it like whatever my whole story is

And then I think what I do is I respond to the moment Happening based on all my anxiety and fear about the next 10 years Which really is very experienced distant from like, I don't know whatever just happened She probably was just embarrassed that she hit her brother. That's all probably it was. And I love that word proponsia. Yes. That's like exactly what's happening.

And just to name it again, just to name it in that way really takes it even add some levity. I feel like that's not even a word I could ever say without laughing just because it kind of has a humorous, right? But then I add levity instead of the kind of intense seriousness of that moment. I think about the story a lot. It's not that exciting of a story,

but it just comes to mind all the time. When I was in my early 20s, I had a lot of back pain. And I went and got an MRI or an X-ray or something like that. And I was, the doctor showed me, oh, you have something called, I think it's called spondylolisthesis. It's like one of your lumbar is slightly out of trajectory with the rest and I was like what do you do about it? And he said I don't know you have to talk to a physical therapist about that

But isn't it nice to know there's some pathology and At the moment I found it annoying but over like over time. I've been like yes, I'm not making this up there is a problem here and it's like a known condition that has a name. And the same thing with this fast forwarding that we all do, that we can tend to write off as like a bespoke, unique, personalized form of lunacy that only we are doing.

But the fact that there's a name for it, and it's 2600 years old really takes some of the air out of it. You don't have to take it personally. It's just a natural phenomenon that happens with all of us. Well, I also think what it does in naming a problem, what's nice is we often are mislabeling the problem. I would think in a moment that the problem is my daughter's so disrespectful and she's going to be a lying teenager. But that's actually, there is a problem, but that's actually not the problem. The problem is my fast-forwarding to the future and not being able to stay grounded in this moment, right? So the problem, whatever it was with your back, now that you know what it is, you probably aren't staying up being

like, I wonder if it's cancer, and I wonder if it's this liver disease, right? You know what it is. And so that stops all of that kind of anxious worry. I think you and I in many ways are in the same business, which is that there are so many ways in which the way the mind works prevents us from seeing things clearly and then acting sanely. And so you just want as many tools. And I'm not a meditation fundamentalist. I'm a huge fan of it, but meditation is one of many tools that can help you not get yanked around by all of these evolutionarily wired quirks to the human mind. I think that's exactly right.

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and hello to hassle free mornings with Garanimals. Okay, so you're not a meditation fundamentalist, but you do know quite a bit about meditation, right? I bet it is now you better. Well, it's 10 years, right? Yes, 10 years since I wrote the book since you wrote 10% happier. I'm curious Like what it's like for you 10 years later to look back. I think about what it'll be like to look back on my book I'm sure I'll be like, I can't believe I haven't said some of that like I don't even believe that anymore

Wow, I can't believe I thought't said some of that. Like I don't even believe that anymore. Or wow, I can't believe I thought that then. I think that even more now. Could you speak a little bit about the kind of your evolution and your approach to meditation and the self from 10 years ago? I did make some changes in the book. I re-read it and this edition that I just put out is revised. There were things about the culture 10 years ago that, I mean, they were small, but they were, reading it now, there were things that were like mildly offensive. I made some joke about bearded swamis or something like that,

which at the time, nobody flags, but now I read it and I was like, why am I not canceled for this? You know, it was a flip and disrespectful. And so I took out things like that. I'm not that I think people should be canceled for something like that, but it's more like, a certain amount of sensitivity makes sense.

It wasn't in line with your current values. Exactly, exactly. But the bigger things are like, I just stunned by the passage of time. And you know how when you first have a kid, everybody says, enjoy every moment. It's like this thing, everybody, it's like this hiccup everybody has, enjoy every chair, share every moment.

And at first I was a little annoyed by that because it just seemed rote. But now I realize that what's going on is that life moves incredibly quickly and you, the most jarring example of that is how fast your kids grow up. It's hard to talk about this without lapsing into cliche, but it is really true. And I mean, that's how cliches get to be cliches.

They're true. And so for me, for 10 years to have passed since the book came out, it just, it is kind of stunning. I also feel, yeah, reading back, reading the book back, that I am quite different. The technology works, you know, 10% happier. I like to think of it like an investment, so it compounds annually.

So I don't know what the number is now. I mean, it was always a joke, the 10%, but I'm a lot happier. And what's interesting in like the last couple of years for a bunch of reasons have been very difficult objectively. My wife's had some health problems and I've had some business tumult and so there's there've been like difficult things in my life. Yes. And yet there've been and I've had many sleepless nights in the last couple of years and yet they've been two of the best years of my life And so how can those things coexist? I think it's that

you get the compounding effect of of putting in the work and That's why I recommend people start up with Meditation or therapy or whatever it is is gonna that's gonna help you if you can just be consistent It doesn't have to be a huge time. So if you can be consistent over time, it's just, it will pay off when you need it. Yeah. So I'm curious, you wrote the book before you had a kid. Yes, yes.

Now your dad, nine year old, has that changed how you look back at the book? Like, are there things that feel more true now or feel harder to put into practice, you know, now that your parent or feels so important for your son to learn in this world he's growing up in? One thing is that parents ask me all the time, how do I get my kids to meditate? And I've learned through having a son that you should not try. I've learned through having a son that you should not try My parents Were very annoying about certain things like I couldn't have sugar. I

Wasn't allowed to like watch TV Now I eat candy all the time and I worked inside the box for for 30 years So yeah, exactly But so I didn't do anything they lectured me about, but I did, I do everything I saw them do. So they were very avid exercisers. They were very serious about their careers. They were both physicians.

They were very serious about their relationship. They were very serious about doing good things in the world, family, the extended family. All those things are massive priorities for me now, but not because I was lectured about it, more that I absorbed it. And so with my son, you know, he knows I meditate. He, he travels with me like you. I travel and give a lot of speeches.

So I usually, last year, I think my son missed a couple of months of school because I just pulled him out and took him with me and with the teacher's permission. And so he's seen me give my talk a million times, but I never say to him, hey, you should meditate or force him to meditate. But he has picked it up and I'll give you an example. Like he, I found out from his principle that he had started guiding kids in school

in loving kindness meditation, which is the cheesiest form of meditation there is. I mean, I'm a huge fan of it, but it's very corny and he's a very sort of heteronormative nine year old football watching kid. And he started guiding the kids in his school in loving kindness meditation. And the high school heard about it

and asked him to come to a high school, all school assembly in the gym with hundreds of kids and guide them in loving kindness meditation. And I came with him that day and he was nervous beforehand, but then they called his name and he marched up there and he grabbed the mic and he guided these kids in meditation and that I never taught him any of this.

And so my point to all of this is if you want mindful kids, if you want healthy, sane kids, you gotta be healthy and sane and mindful yourself. And so that has been a big learning for me. The other thing is just this capacity, two things, the capacity to be awake and aware for what's happening right now, to be present, to use the cliche.

I mean, that is, because it moves so fast, that is an incredibly valuable skill. And I don't wanna look back at this time and think, I let it, I wasted it, I let it all slip by. And so meditation has been really helpful in that regard. And then the other thing is that there are so many moments that are really difficult, where having the ability to regulate my own emotions

has been very helpful. having the ability to regulate my own emotions has been very helpful. In particular, when he does things that I hate about myself, so his anxiety can be triggering for me, or if he's like talking nonsense or like bragging or you know, talking out of his, yeah, that's because that's what I do. You know, that's what I did when I was a kid

and I still see that tendency in my mind now and I don't like that about myself. So when I do. You know, that's what I did when I was a kid. And I still see that tendency in my mind now. And I don't like that about myself. So when I see that in him, it's easy for me to, I think if I didn't have these tools, I might have scarred him in some ways. I might have been overly harsh with him. And who knows, I probably did that too. But I've caught myself a lot when he's crying

and I'm in my mind saying, oh, he's being manipulative or histrionic or whatever. You know, what do I really know? And so being able to have a break on some of my more harsh tendencies, I think has been really helpful. If parents are listening and they're thinking like, how do I start this? Like, because, okay, I hear the benefits.

It would definitely help most parents. We know this to like be a little more present, more regulated in the moment. Every, I hear the benefits. It would definitely help most parents. We know this to be a little more present, more regulated in the moment. Every parent I know wants that. What are some of the ways that very busy parents that you recommend, they actually start some practice that is a small step that's both, you know, meaningful and impact, but also, you know, possible.

Yeah. In actuality. This is a great question. And we talked about it a little bit at the beginning. So I'll just go back to it. Just the overarching thing to say is, and you know this, but just for the listeners, that what we know about habit formation is that it's just diabolically hard.

And actually, that sounds dark, but it's nice to know there's pathology. Just to know is not just hard for you. It's hard for everybody, especially when you've got a bunch of demands on you. So I'm speaking from a very sympathetic, non-pressuring perch here, when I say these things. So what we know from the data is that if you're trying to start a habit,

starting small is incredibly useful. So my little mantras here are one minute counts and daily ish. I think it's really important to give yourself the flexibility to screw up, you know, fall off the wagon and start again as million times. Just the way in meditation, you know, quote unquote, messing up and getting distracted. You have to, you know, it's like you want to be able to give yourself permission to start over a million times. Same with this, you can, maybe you'll get on a good streak for a few weeks, but then life happens

and you eight weeks later, you realize you haven't meditated once, nothing's been lost, just start again. So I wanna set the bar low, I'll take the pressure out of this and say that you can integrate this into the little nooks and crannies of your day, very brief meditations, and don't force yourself to do it every day because inevitably you will miss a day and then the voice in your head will tell you

you're a failure. So the other thing is that you can co-opt natural moments in your day, like doing the dishes or like just walking around, changing a diaper. All of this, all of these rote activities where you might be stewing or my, you know, I'm not anti daydreaming, but a lot of the time when we're in our what the what brain scientists call the default mode of our of our minds of our brains that we're just we're thinking in ways that are making us unhappy and so if you can co-op some of these moments that otherwise you'd be And so if you can co-op some of these moments that otherwise you'd be smusing darkly on something and just to drop into the raw data of what's happening right now, what does the water feel like on my hands? What does this toothbrush feel like in my hands?

What does the body feel like as it's moving through space? That's mindfulness. Wait, I want to go through that with like washing the dishes because are you saying, it's right you're like, you're going to the dishes regardless. Yes, like that's happening. Yes, and if I leave myself to my own devices I'm probably saying like I can't believe I have to do this or this is like one of a million things I need to do and or maybe I'm thinking of I can't leave my son didn't listen to me He's a sociopath and I'm just like telling myself that story over and over so I'm doing the activity anyway it's already built into my day. And if I leave myself to more mindlessness,

I'm probably going in a direction that's interesting. I didn't know that. Like that's probably gonna work against me. Probably. So what's the road activity for you? Is it dishes? I don't know. Do you do this?

Does your husband do the dishes? Loading and unloading the dishwasher. I'm up early in the morning. So I generally go and I'll hear the beeping from the night before. I don't be like, okay, I'm gonna just get this done. So unloading the dishwasher is a perfect one. And what is happening in your mind generally

while you're doing that? I think I'm thinking of everything I need to do that day and I'm getting overwhelmed already about this list and it's like 6.30 in the morning or something. We talked briefly before we started rolling and maybe of the opinion that perhaps you're doing too much. But I say this as somebody who has fallen into that hole myself many times.

But having said that, like there's a certain amount of planning for the day ahead that is useful. And so there's this line between useless, mentation and cogitation thinking useful. You know, I call it constructive anguish, certain amount of plotting and planning that makes sense. And then often we tip over very quickly into useless worry

and projection, propuncia, et cetera, et cetera. So having like a release valve on some of that, a practice where you are deliberately turning the volume down a little bit, trying to focus on what's happening right now, and then when all that stuff bursts through the wall, like the Kool-Aid man, like that's cool, you just notice it and start again and start again. And so unloading the dishwasher or loading the dishwasher

is a good moment for that because there's a lot of mechanics to arm is moving, you're grasping porcelain or metal and then you're putting it in. There's maybe moisture on your hand. There could be coolness or warmth in the overall air. The body is maybe crouched down a little bit so you feel it in your hunches. There's a lot to tune into if the channels are open. And so just exploring, like what's a, what are the physical sensations? What am I hearing? What am I feeling?

What's the temperature? And then inevitably you're gonna get distracted a million times and that's cool, catch it, great. And then go back. That is a full-fledged meditation. Interesting. So to flesh that out even more specifically, so I'm doing this,

would I be literally narrating to myself, grabbing the fork? Or is it more like, no, Becky, that's working too hard, just notice it without, like I wanna get into this specific. You're asking, these are really good questions. And I'm glad you're asking them. There is a concept in Buddhist meditation of right effort.

So it's, this is really one of the trickiest parts of meditation, like how hard should you try? And the only way to figure this out is to mess it up over and over and over again, because especially for Taipei people, we're gonna wanna win at meditation. And so, you know, this is just a thing to notice about your mind, which

eventually becomes very powerful. You notice how hard you're pushing all the time. And so meditation can be like a crucible where you're really seeing this. So to answer the actual question you asked, which is, should I be narrating, there is a technique called mental noting. So it wouldn't be so much like, I, Becky, am now picking up the fork. It's more like dropping little words into the mind that help you direct your mind to the sensation, like moving, coolness, tension, tightness. You don't want to be like, you don't want to be noting, noting, noting all the time. Just dropping it in once in a while as a way to help direct the mind to the raw data of the physical sensations. Does that make sense? That makes so much sense.

Right effort. I like that. Okay, I'm going to go for this one too. I feel like I noticed my work day. I will bring my phone to the bathroom. Oh yeah, I'd do that too. So is that another, could I just like, mindfully? Yeah, pee, yeah, or more, yes.

Yeah, whatever I'm gonna do. Like, just walking to the bathroom without my phone. Like that could be, that happens in multiple times a day. So that could be a shift from just some mindless moment where, yeah, again, I'm probably like on email or whatever I'm doing right into the moment I get to the bathroom to like, that's my break.

That's the way of infusing mindfulness into my already busy day, because I'm already going to the moment I get to the bathroom, to like, that's my break. That's the way of infusing mindfulness into my already busy day, so I'm already going to the bathroom. I love the way you're thinking about this. You can view your day as a target rich environment for mindfulness breaks. So there are these things that you non-negotiably have to do throughout the day,

like going to the bathroom, eating, drinking, moving from one meeting to the next, and you can put the phone away. This doesn't have to be onerous at all. It can be a minute, two, three minutes. Put the phone away and just tune in during those moments. And then again, you're going to get distracted a bunch, but those distractions are so useful because you start to understand what are the habits of Becky's mind and are some of these really counterproductive and can I learn to spot them and ride them instead of drowning in them? Does that land? Yes, so helpful.

I'm curious in the 10 years, going back to the book, I mean, we had cell phones then, but I feel like phones didn't play the same role in our lives. Has that impacted how you look back on the book or the way you think about mindfulness now? Maybe it's even more important. Is it even harder to do? Both of the things you just said, it's more important and it's harder to do. We're not going to change it and I'm not anti-technology. I just think I think it's useful for people in my position to say that out loud because it's nice for people listening to have their experience validated. That yeah, if you're noticing you're more distracted these days than you used to be, you're not making that up.

Sorry, there's a siren here, but the siren really does like put some punctuation and exclamation onto how hard the situation is. It's a bit of a psychological emergency. We don't have space. There are very few moments in our life where we're not stimulated. And again, I remember in 2007 or eight

when I got my first iPhone thinking, I'll never be bored again. And it was like a great feeling. But that sound we're listening to right now, that's what we're curating a nonstop siren and horn in our head all the time. And we need to, and stuff like, you can't live without it,

but it's hard for most of us to live without it in the modern world. And so this is just a thing we have to learn how to navigate. And there's, you know, Catherine Price, have you ever talked to her? Catherine Price, she'd have her on the show. She's a mom and she wrote a book

called How to Break Up with Your Phone. And there are lots of like ways to create some distance with your phone that mindfulness can superpower, supercharge. Yeah. Any last words you wanna leave for the parents listening? Cause I feel like you've already done such a service. I feel like probably the number one thing that gets in people's way of meditating

is the thought that I'm not a good meditator. I've tried it before and I can't do it. It doesn't work for me, right? And to give people a different framework, no, that probably means you're doing it really well. So like good job, right? I think is just so hopeful and empowering. So I think parents have gotten that

and I'm glad to really, really drive that message home. Anything else? I mean, just what's coming to mind as you're talking is that, I think in our best moments, we're really understanding and forgiving of our kids for their mistakes in our best moments. In our best moments, yeah. But you can channel that attitude toward yourself because so much of what we're talking about today is this kind of perfectionist, perfectionistic attitude that we bring to meditation, to parenting,

to everything. And that's totally unreasonable. And we wouldn't, in our say say in her moments apply it to our kids And so can you channel some of the? Magnanimity that you bring to your kids to yourself and there's a lot of data that I'm sure you're familiar with about the effectiveness of self compassion which is really just talking to yourself the way you would talk to a friend or a kid in your good moments of talking to the kid and That can you can channel that even towards your parenting.

Okay, Becky, Dan, whoever, I, yeah, I blew that moment with my kid, but like that's part of being alive and the potential for repair is there. In fact, you couldn't repair if you didn't screw up. Can you have a Dr. Becky or a Dan in your head who's coaching you the way you would in your best moments coach your kid? That's a mental habit that is available to all of us that I would highly recommend. Love that. Well, thank you. Congratulations. 10 years since 10% happier. And I believe it the compounding impact is just small steps in the right direction. Right? They compound into amazing results.

I mean, there was a great tweet recently from Roshi Joan Halifax, who's an American-based Zen master. And it was the squiggly line, the line was just going all over the frame, and then she wrote in the caption, the path. I mean, that's what, we're all like a mess, and this is going to be like marginal, messy, uneven improvement over time. And that's available to all of us. And that's the best it gets. That is the best it gets. Yeah.

Absolutely. Thank you. Pleasure. Thank you. Thank you to our podcast sponsors, Airbnb and Garanimals. Parenting is the hardest and most important job in the world. And you deserve resources and support so you feel empowered and confident for this very important job you hold. I'm so excited to share Good Inside membership. It's the first platform that brings together content and experts you trust

with a global community of like-valued parents. It's game-changing and built for a busy parent who wants to make the most out of the few minutes they have. Good Inside with Dr. Becky is produced by Jesse Baker and Eric Newsom at Magnificent Noise. Our production staff includes Sabrina Farhi, Julia Knapp and Kristen Muller. I would also like to thank Eric Kabelski,

Mary Panico, Brooke Zant, and the rest of the Good Inside team. And one last thing before I let you go. Let's end by placing our hands on our hearts and reminding ourselves, even as I struggle, and even as I have a hard time on the outside, I remain good inside. Music