Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris - 209: Kryptonite for the Inner Critic, Self-Compassion Series, Kristin Neff, PhD

Episode Date: October 16, 2019

Life can be challenging. It’s comforting to have kind, supportive people around you to help you through it. Dr. Kristin Neff believes it’s equally important to cultivate a kind, supportive inner voice. In her last year of graduate school Neff was going through what she calls a messy divorce. Looking for a way to alleviate the strong feelings of stress and shame she was experiencing, she found meditation. Drawn to the integration of mindfulness and compassion practices, she was able to work through her emotional turmoil. She came to the realization that she deserved kindness and encouragement and she didn’t need to rely on anyone other than herself to fulfill those needs. That epiphany inspired her to spend the next several years of her life doing self-compassion work. Neff believes self-compassion is a trainable skill anyone can learn, even those who are not naturally inclined to be kind to themselves. She recently co-created a workbook that guides the reader through the practices of mindful self-compassion, hoping to help others experience the life-changing benefits of being kind to ourselves. Plug Zone Website: https://self-compassion.org/ Workbook: https://self-compassion.org/mindful-self-compassion-workbook/ Twitter: @self_compassion TED Talk: https://ed.ted.com/on/zhq011AI ***VOICEMAILS*** Have a question for Dan? Leave us a voicemail: 646-883-8326 See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Before we jump into today's show, many of us want to live healthier lives, but keep bumping our heads up against the same obstacles over and over again. But what if there was a different way to relate to this gap between what you want to do and what you actually do? What if you could find intrinsic motivation for habit change that will make you happier instead of sending you into a shame spiral? Learn how to form healthy habits without kicking your own ass unnecessarily by taking our healthy habits course over on the 10% happier app. It's taught by the Stanford psychologist Kelly McGonical and the Great Meditation Teacher Alexis

Santos to access the course. Just download the 10% happier app wherever you get your apps or by visiting 10% calm. All one word spelled out. Okay on with the show. For ABC, this is the 10% happier podcast. I'm Dan Harris. One of the core questions I've been hustling over for the last decade as a meditator is, how can I be great at what I do? How can I continue to be ambitious while not making myself miserable?

And a question within that question is, can I push forward in a tough and disciplined way without beating myself up so much? I think a lot of people believe that the only reason we're successful is because we liberally apply what I call the internal cattle prod or my dad had an expression, the price of security is insecurity. And I still, as I said before, I still believe that a certain amount of suffering and plotting and planning and hand-ranging is necessary, but it's become increasingly obvious to me,

even in the last year, really, that the amount of self-inflicted pain can go way down and and you can continue to be not only just as good as you were before, but even better. And a key figure in really establishing scientific evidence behind this argument is our guest this week. Her name is Kristen Neff. She's an associate professor at the University of Texas at Austin, long time practitioner in the Insight Meditation tradition. And she has really been the prime mover in the scientific research around something called self-compassion. We talk a lot in this episode about what blocks people from practicing self-compassion, especially for people like me who find it sort of an annoyingly syrupy. She talks a lot about

the scientific evidence. She talks about the difference between self-compassion and self-esteem and how understanding that can make a key difference and why it's saner to employ a self-compassionate strategy with yourself, especially even in a highly competitive career such as the one or two that I've chosen, as opposed to just constantly kicking your own butt. I want to say before we dive in that if you're interested in actually practicing this stuff, we've got a number of self-compassion focused meditations up on the 10% happier app. We also have a whole course on self-compassion and other compassion led by Sharon Salzburg. It's

called 10% nicer. That's up on the app. And then Joseph Goldstein has a whole course based on compassion practices all up on the app. And if you haven't checked out the app, you can always do so you can do so at any time. And there's a seven-day free trial. It's great stuff. Really proud of the work that's being done on the app. And really really proud to bring you Chris to NEP. So here we go. Nice to see you. Thank you for doing this. I've been wanting to talk to you for a while actually, because I'm actually writing a book about kindness right now, and I want to do a chapter about self-compassion. So you are the leading expert. So before we get to self-compassion, though, I want to

hear how you got interested in meditation in the first place. Right. So, it was my last year of graduate school. I was finishing up my PhD at Berkeley. And basically, my life was a mess. I had gotten out of a divorce. It was a very messy divorce. I was feeling a lot of shame. And I was also feeling a lot of stress.

Not so much about what I finished my PhD, but more after seven years of my life when I get a job, the job mark goes really tight. And so I thought, well, I've heard that meditation is good for stress, and it was Berkeley. So right down the street for me was the meditation group. So I was lucky. I'll go right down every street. Right down every street, yeah, so that you know on every corner and but luckily the one I chose to go to the woman leaving the group it was actually a tiktok Han Sanga

um just a little bit about who he is just for the few well yeah I mean I it's up to you I don't only practice in his good reason is important is because some meditation teachers mindfulness men of teachers wouldn't necessarily talk about self-compassion. But Tiktokheim, one thing that's unique about him is he's really emphasized as the heart qualities of practice. Especially since he's a Vietnamese Zen master and Zen doesn't talk a lot about compassionful stuff, as I understand it.

Right, but he does, in particular, right. And so I started in his tradition, and the very first night I went, the woman talked about having compassion for yourself, that you needed to actively cultivate compassion for yourself as well as others. And so I was also learning mindfulness, but because my life was such a mess, because I was such a mess, you know, almost immediately I saw the difference it made when I turned toward myself with this kind of kind of warm, supportive attitude, I just saw my own experience and really made a difference. And then I started practicing more in the Insight

Meditation tradition. I think because I'm a scientist, it just was a little more compatible with my way of approaching things, but with people like Jack Cornfield, the path with heart, Sharon Salzburg, Levinge kindness. So I was always really drawn to the integration of, you might say, the spaciousness of mindfulness with the heart-opening qualities of compassion. And I was fortunate because it was there and by practice from the very beginning. And that was about 20 years ago. And let me just jump in and define terms for people because some people... Yes.

I just never know. We have a lot of experienced meditators who listen, I've heard new folks who are coming every week. So, once you start to meditate, there are lots of ways to meditate. There are lots of ways to meditate. And within Buddhism, there are, I would say, at least two big skills we're trying to teach. One is mindfulness, which is, put simply the ability not to be yacked around by your

emotions. Yes, like that. The other is compassion, or if you're afraid as I am of gooey words, you can just re-translate that into friendliness, just kind of a cooler, calmer, nicer attitude toward external and internal phenomena. Although, can I replace the word cooler with warmer? Sure, yes, better. I mean cooler than I thought.

I know what you mean. I know what you mean. But fair enough. So it sounds like you pivoted from the initial Zen tradition into what's known as the insight tradition, which is just another form of Buddhist meditation. It's actually the school I've trained in and do stumbled upon teachers like Jack Cornfield, Sharon Salzburg, both of whom have written a lot about

mindfulness, again, just being able to be non-judgmentally aware of stuff and compassion, which is adding in the not just non-judgmentally aware, but having a certain element of warmth in the awareness. Right, and so the mindfulness is aimed at holding experience in a non-judgmental manner. So the compassion is aimed at holding the experience there in a friendly manner. And so they have slightly different targets.

And so both need to be practiced. That can actually almost appear to conflict sometimes because you accept your experience as it is, including the fact that it's painful, at the same time that you're wishing yourself well and you want to help. And so it almost forms a bit of a paradox. Actually, one of the sayings we like to say is we give ourselves compassion not to feel better, but because we feel bad.

So you have to allow the experience to be as it is at the same time as toward the experience or because you're friendly because you care, you do what you can to help. So one paradox is, since, sorry, let me see if I can restate that, and I'm also thinking that there may be yet another paradox.

Probably. One paradox is, you, in mindfulness meditation, we are not trying to control anything. We're just trying to see things as they are. See clearly. Insight is the clear seeing of whatever is happening, so that it doesn't own us. But in this case, when you add in the compassion layer, you're trying to notice that they're suffering there. And you're not trying to alleviate it per se, you're just sending warmth toward the suffering as it is.

Right, you aren't trying to manipulate your experience, because if you use compassion to try to make the pain go away, it's actually just another form of resistance. So you have to fully accept the fact that this is painful, this hurts, you know, and that's the mindfulness, validating and accepting the fact that this is really painful right now. And at the same time we give ourselves warmth and kindness, you know, I'm so sorry, it's so painful. Is there anything I can do to help and support myself in this moment, right? And so they're targeted kind of two different targets.

So they have to be both held together. And you know, they say compassion and wisdom, they're two wings of a bird. We need both wings. We need to tend toward ourselves at the same time we accept our experience. All right. Well, I was just going to ask you how we do this because I think most of the listeners will understand basic mindfulness meditation will pick the breath as our object. We sit and try to feel the breath every time we get distracted, which will happen a million times, we start again. Compassion, meditation, or self-compassion meditation involves a little bit more kind of discursive thinking, or not discursive thinking, targeted thinking, where you are sending well wishes

toward yourself. And you did this little thing where you said, I'm so sorry, you're feeling this way, is there anything I can do? And that for me is a typical Western raised in patriarchal system guy. I think I'm not gonna say that to myself. Right, right, right. Do I have to do that? You don't have to do it that way.

You can give yourself, you can do it physically. So what we're doing is, there's really two different safety systems. So we're activating the care safety system, because as mammals, when we come out of the womb, the way we feel safe is by connection with other people. Connection, love, warmth, that's what allows us to feel safe. And so what we're doing is we're kind of intentionally

targeting the care system. And you can do it with language, but it's true that English doesn't work for everyone. You can do it with physical touch, so like you know putting your hand on your body in a way that feels supportive. You can just do it with with friendliness like, hey it's okay, you can call yourself buddy if you want. Whatever works the language, it doesn't really matter what the language is. What matters is the attitude of caring and warmth, and that can be expressed in a lot of ways.

But mindfulness, it's not intended to be a standalone practice where it's just about accepting and experience completely as it is. The reason we practice is because we want to alleviate suffering. Right? And so ironically, when we practice, we have to accept what's happening because we don't, it's going to make things worse. But at the same time, it's really helpful. So for instance, there's some research that shows if you teach people some self-compassion

before they learn mindfulness meditation, they're more likely to stick with it. Because what happens is, you know, the mind starts saying, oh, I can't do this, I'm so bad at this and it starts judging, you, I can't do this, I'm so bad at this, and it starts judging. You know, we start judging ourselves. And although it is, we want to accept that and just see them as thoughts. It really makes a difference if you give yourself some kindness. Oh, man, that's kind of hard. I'm like, it's okay.

You know, the friendliness, the warmth, the human connection. And I know people get confused because it's self-compassion, but compassion is inherently connected. The word compassion in the Latin means to suffer with. And so when you give yourself compassion, it's not really aimed at yourself. It's just opening up. You're actually becoming less self-issue, your focus is less on the self. And just remembering that all people are imperfect. All people suffer. It's not just me.

And that's where some of the feelings of connectedness come. So connectedness and kindness and mindfulness, those three components, at least the way I think about it, make up the experience of compassion. I want to get back to literally how we do this because... Yeah. Because that's where I've been spending the last 10 years doing. Yeah, and I can't imagine myself giving myself a hug. So, but before we go there, I just want to get back to the,

because I said earlier that there was a second paradox, and you just touched on it, which is in mindfulness meditation, especially in the Buddhist tradition, one of the goals they hold out, which is very confusing for people, is that you will ultimately see through the illusion of the self. Absolutely. And yet, here you are talking about self-compassion. Yes, that's right. And so it's confusing. So, for instance, I was talking to one Buddhist teacher, he said, you didn't even bat her nine. He said, oh, you just mean inner compassion.

If you think of it as inwardly directed compassion, supposed to just outwardly directed compassion, and of course compassion is unidirectional inside and outside, then it makes sense. The word self is like a heuristic, but you don't need an actual sense of separate self to give yourself inner compassion. Does anybody outside of academia use the word heuristic? I mean, I love the word, it's great. I don't probably not. Basically, it's a useful concept. It's useful. I think of it as useful. It's a useful tool. We don't have to take it very seriously. I just want to congratulate you,

I think being the first person on nearly 200 episodes to use the word heuristic. No, it's great. I'm not even teasing you. I think it's awesome. Anyway, yeah, there are a lot of paradoxes. But you know, so going back to it, and I'm really glad you're bringing this up because in a way, one of the big blocks, especially for men, to practicing self-compassion,

and which is a shame because we know for their research is one of the most powerful sources of strength, coping, and resilience we have available to us. One of the blocks especially for men is it goes against gender roles. It seems too feminine. It seems weak. It seems flowery. Or uncomfortable. Yeah, because men especially are socialized against expressing this type of warmth and tenderness. Even outwardly. Even outwardly, yeah. And even outwardly, but especially when you add the word self, I mean, isn't self-along

and it's magazine for goodness sake, right? I don't know that I thought that, but I mean, I have a four-year-old, it's the first time my first, I were a first and only child. I'm really tender with him, although I also like rough house with him and, you know, I use fat thighs and all that stuff. But that's the first time I life other than maybe with cats or some of their dogs that I've been really tender and probably with cats and dogs when nobody's looking. Right.

And so the idea of the proposition that you have already articulated here that I should say these super warm things that I would never, I've never probably, other than to my son, set out loud or to hug myself. It's just hard. It's uncomfortable. I buy it But it's comfortable. Yeah, it is and you don't have and again, you find ways of doing it that are more comfortable for instance So the UT I Work a university of Texas at Austin and so the longhorn men's basketball team as we can come in and give the guys a training

How'd that go? Great. Cause I didn't use the word self compassion once because it's triggering. There's no, there's no read the word, nothing special about the word. I talked about inner resilience and inner strength training. And so basically, so when you're out there, when you're playing, you know, what, what mental voice do you want in your head? Do you want to coach you saying you're suck? You can't do it. You know, your crap.

You should be ashamed of yourself. I can't believe you mess it. Shot. Or do you want to coach, you're saying, you're suck, you can't do it, you know, you're crap. You should be ashamed of yourself. I can't believe you messed that shot. Or do you want to coach, saying, hey, it's okay. This is maybe what went wrong. We can do this. I'm here, I'm supportive. So kind of an encouraging, supportive kind voice. It doesn't have to take a particular form.

The form, the kind of mistakes depends on what you need. And maybe what you need is not a hug. Maybe that's not gonna be helpful for you. But maybe you need just kind of a little encouragement or a little understanding or just a little sense of acceptance. And so people find their own way into self-compassion. But the goal is just to be a supportive, kind, encouraging, helpful, beneficial, friendly presence.

Right. And so if the word, friendliness, works for you, that works for me. So for instance, in our training program for teens, we call it making friends with yourself. And so you could absolutely use that metaphor and you could think, what would you say to a friend? So the types of things, let's say you had a friend, maybe one of your buddies come to you and say, you know, damn, I'm so upset, this is happening, or I got a cancer diagnosis

or something like that. What types of things would you say to support your friend? Because that's the language that probably works for you, and you can try to use that type of language with yourself. The language itself is not important. What's important is this feeling of support, encouragement, and kindness. What if I don't like myself? Right.

So, in a way, this is what self-compassion is exactly designed to address. I mean, it's helpful for everyone. Many people internalize these ideas that I'm not good enough, you know, I'm flawed, or maybe you rejected by your parents. So, first of all, the first thing self-compassion does is tune into the pain of that. You know, wow, that's kind of, that's hard, right? If you don't like yourself. And it's not about saying, it's not self-esteem. Self-esteem is, I judge myself positively, or I judge myself negatively.

Compared to other people. And also compared to other people. And self-esteem is really contingent. It's dependent on success. If you don't succeed, your self-esteem deserts you. It's a fair-weather friend. So self-compassion, this kind of more unconditionally friendly attitude,

just says, you know, hey, everyone's imperfect, that's part of the human experience. One thing we like to say is the goal of practice is simply to become a compassionate mess. You're still a mess, you know, you do what you can, but you're a human, so by definition, you're going to be a mess. But can you hold that mess with kindness, with friendliness? Because if you don't, if you take, if you take, it's kind of, again, another paradox. If you take that, your imperfection or messiness personally, if you identify with it as who you are, then you aren't seeing the whole picture. Because as, you know, when you really start getting into practice, the reality of who we are is so much bigger than this particular moment in time.

We identify this experience into a sense of solid self. When reality, this is just what's unfolding. You might say we hold this unfolding mess with great compassion and kindness and friendliness. And the warmth is important. And again, just going back to the physiology, we are mammals, right? And we've got especially human mammals. Humans are born the most immature. It takes 25 to 27 years for the prefrontal cortex to fully mature.

In my case, it's taken nearly. Yeah, and I like to show it. It may take another five years for the kidsfrontal cortex, the fully mature. In my case, it's taken nearly three. Yeah, and I like to say I can take another five years for the kids to actually leave home. And the reason that's because the human brain is so plastic and it's able to change and evolve, that's why we're such slow developers. But physiologically, we needed a system in place that would prompt the infant or the child to be safe by being taken care of by parents or people who elders who take care of them, and that would also prompt the parents to take care of the child. So we have a very evolved care system as part of our physiology.

And so we know again from the science is when you're kind yourself, when you're friendly towards yourself, touch is one way to do it, but other ways to do it as well. You actually lower the cortisol levels, you reduce the sympathetic nervous reactivity, and you actually activate things like heart rate variability. Probably oxytocin, the dots haven't been totally connected, so, but most likely you're increasing an oxytocin. You're actually activating this physiological system that's designed to make us feel safe.

The problem with not liking yourself is it's very threatening and you feel isolated. And so remembering that, hey, everyone's imperfect, you know, it's okay to make mistakes. Can I learn from it? What we find is that friendly supportive attitude, it has all sorts of benefits. It increases motivation. It allows you to cope. So just for an example, there was one study done of soldiers who had come back from Iraq and Afghanistan and actually seen action overseas.

And they found that how soldiers treated themselves, how compassionate they were to themselves around that the real trauma they had experienced was a very powerful predictor of whether or not they developed PTSD nine months later, post-traumatic stress disorder, and in fact it was more powerful than how much action they had seen. So more important than what you experience in life is how you relate to yourself in the midst of that experience when it's when it's really traumatic or difficult. And so, you know, when people say self-compassion is a weakness, not for these soldiers, you know, and if you think again to use the metaphor, if you think of life as a battle in some ways, it's challenging. It's really hard to be a human being, you know, it always has been,

but you might say even especially now, when you go into those these challenges or when you go into battle, who do you want inside your head? Do you want an ally who's saying, I'm on your side, I'm here to support you, do you want to be a friend, that kind of that warmth, that care, that I'm going to do what I can to try to meet your needs as best I can? Do you want that voice inside your head? Or do you want a voice that shames you and say, it says, you're not good enough and you're not good as a good as this other person, you know, kind of a very deftest voice. And strong self-criticism, people think it makes them stronger.

It actually doesn't. You're actually pulling out the rug from underneath yourself. Now, again, that doesn't mean it's like, Stuart Smiley, I'm great, I'm wonderful. Yeah, no, what you're saying is, I acknowledge I'm a flawed human being. Everyone is a flawed human being. I'm going to try to be as friendly and supportive as I can.

I'm going to try to learn from my mistakes. It's supposed to take my mistakes personally. What can I learn from this? And that kind of attitude of learning and growth actually is a very powerful way to actually succeed and be more motivated. So it makes you more strong, not weaker. It makes you more motivated, not less. It actually allows you to feel more connected,

not more isolated, right? A lot of people have misconceptions about self-compassion that it's, you know, at least the self-pity or self-indulgence. They're all completely the opposite. So the entire practice in a weird way is paradoxical. I just was taking some notes here because I realized there were about six things I need to follow. Okay, that's a sign of a good guess, by the way, so I don't say that to criticize.

I know I've been promising the listener that will dive into the nitty gritty of how to actually do this thing, but you've raised a couple of things that I do think we need to chase down. You talked about Stuart Smalley. the needy gritty of how to actually do this thing, but you've raised a couple of things that I do think we need to chase down. You talked about Stuart Smalley. Yes. That is a character from Sarah in it live, played by the now, I guess, former Senator resigned under a cloud. Al Franken from Minnesota, back in his acting, comedian days, he was on SNL and he played

a character named Stuart Smalley, would look in the mirror and say something like, I'm good enough. I'm smart enough, and dog-gun it, people like me. Yes. So that is not what you're talking about. That's right. Yeah, it's not positive thinking. It's actually, it's not about judgments or evaluations at all. It's just, I'm a human being, I'm flawed, I'm imperfect, I'm trying to learn and grow,

I'm doing the best I can. And it's really about a supportive, friendly attitude toward oneself. And that support is a tremendous source of strength coping and resilience. And it's one that, you know, it's really kind of, it makes me a bit sad that in our society, we don't utilize this strength. We don't realize that we can actually give ourselves a lot of the support we need, not completely. We are not automatons, but we are so reliant on other people to meet our needs, to make us feel loved, to make us feel supported, to make us feel okay. You know, they've got their own stuff going on.

They can't always be there for ourselves. Some people like to describe self-compassion as a way of reparenting yourself. The ideal parents met your needs consistently. They were warm. They were accepting. They also helped guide you and pointed out where you made mistakes to help you learn and grow and become the person hopefully that would be the ideal person we all want to be. But of course, no one has perfect parents. People who have more supportive, warm, kind caring parents, they do tend to have more natural self-compassion, they internalize that.

People whose parents weren't warm and supportive, they have insecure attachment, it's a little harder. Naturally, you're less self-compassionate. The beautiful thing about this is you can learn it as a skill. This is not just a naturally occurring personality trait. I mean, it is, but it's also a practice. You can actually do this. You can actually cultivate the ability to be kinder and more supportive to yourself, especially when you're struggling. I mean, that's a really exciting thing about self-compassion, is there's a lot of research shows that shows this is actually a trainable skill.

It's interesting to talk about the role of your parents. I had and have very warm supportive parents, And yet I have a very nasty inner narrator, maybe because I descended from a long line of depressives and anxious people and alcoholics, et cetera. Et cetera. And one of the stories I told myself for a long time before getting into meditation was, my father has an expression, which is,

the price of security is insecurity. And I was, we venerate worrying, especially in the Jewish side of my family. And actually that's not his personal motto. I learned later he made that up to make me feel better about the fact that I was worrying all the time. Okay. And I told myself that any success I was experiencing here in the hallways of ABC News where I've been for 19 years now and has traditionally been a very tough place, less so now, but was

very, very tough when I first got here. Was because I was worrying all the time and had very high standards, et cetera, et cetera. Right. And I think a lot of people tell this story. Now, you address this a little bit, but I want you to, I just want to go back to it. This internal cattle prod that many of us have. How do you, what do you say to folks, and I'm sure you hear the argument all the time, like this is the thing that's keeping me afloat.

Right. And, you know, there's a way in which it is true, right? So, for instance, if you have, say, a very, I like to use this example. Let's say a parent is trying to motivate their child. And so in some ways, we are our own parent and our own child, self-disselfulating. So there's two ways to motivate a child to do better. So let's say the child comes home with a failing math grade

and the parent tries to once the child to go to college. So you can motivate that child with fear. You can be really harsh. I'm ashamed of you. You're good for nothing loser. You know, I'm going to ground you for 10 months. Now that will kind of work. The child will probably work harder and study more next time

because they're afraid of getting that negative reaction. So it kind of works, but there are a lot of unintended consequences. For instance,, performance anxiety. They may be so anxious the next time they take the test, it's actually going to allow, that it's going to undermine their ability to do peak performance, a fear of failure. You know, it just, you might develop so much fear that you're going to fail and get, you know, your parents criticism and, you know, grounding or whatever punishment that you get fear of failure. And then eventually

you might give up. So there's another way to motivate that child and that's with encouragement and support. First of all, hey, I'm so sorry you failed. Ouch, bummer. It's okay, I love you anyway. It doesn't affect my love for you. The bottom line is it's okay, you're human, you fail. But because I care about you and I know you want to go to college, what can I do to help you?

How can I support you? Can we look and see your study patterns? Maybe this didn't work out so well. Should we hire an attutor? You know, I believe in you. How can I support you to reach your goals? So, the goals of self-compassionate people are just as high as everyone else's, because of course, you care about yourself, you want to reach your goals.

But what happens when you don't meet them? That's the big difference. So yes, fear, punishment, and kind of in a way this intercritic is kind of harsh self-punishment. It kind of works, but then it might lead to anxiety, neuroticism, depression, you know, look at the epidemic of suicide, and has a lot of negative consequences. You can reach the same heights from this kind, encouraging, supportive approach. And also, you know, what we show with the research shows is, when you feel safe because of

this kind of bottom line, even if I fail, it's gonna be okay. That what we know is, you probably know this negative emotions narrow our focus and positive emotions brought in our focus. So when you feel safe and you've got the positive emotion of kindness and we know that compassion actually is rewarding emotion, it actually allows you to see more possibilities. Maybe you didn't, you know, when you are self-threat focused,

you didn't see this opportunity, but when you feel safe, oh, I see, maybe there's a completely different way to approach it. I didn't even think about. So it allows for more, what they call, and acceptance and commitment therapy. It allows for more psychological flexibility. Which, of course, is gonna make you safer,

because you're ever gonna get a right to do it. Which is gonna make you safer, and it's gonna help you. So actually, we used to believe that the best way to motivate our children was through harsh corporal punishment, spare the rod, spoil the child. And we know pretty, we know well now through a lot of research that actually that's not the best way to motivate our children. It works, but it causes so much damage as other ways to motivate our children.

It doesn't mean you're complacent. Yeah, do whatever you want. That's not healthy. But how do we learn? How do we grow? How do we, you know, recover from our mistakes and do better next time? All in the context of the bottom line is I love you, you know. We can actually learn to do that with ourselves. It does feel weird at first. I'm not going to lie. If you spent your whole life

relating to yourself in a particular way, you know, kind of with this harshness, it feels little strange to be more friendly towards yourself. But you can practice it and it does get easier with time. And I really encourage people to find their own authentic voice. Again, for you down, I'm not going to suggest you hug yourself. It's not going to work. But there may be, you know, some other ways, what works for you, what helps you feel more accepted, you know, more encouraged, more cared for, and using those pathways in. Oh, it's going to tell a story that I, I don't know if I've told this on the podcast before. So if you've heard this before, I apologize, but I, about 10, 11 months ago, no, maybe nine months ago, I can't write.

Anyway, not that long ago, did a retreat as part of this book that I'm writing about the kindness I did. I did a one on, I convinced that one of my favorite meditation teachers who has a real focus on compassion and self-compassion. Her name is Spring Washam. Oh, yeah. Yeah, she's a great plus. She's a phenomenal human being and has been on the show a couple times. And she and I did a one-on-one compassion retreat.

Okay. So this was not just self-compassion, but compassion writ large. Yeah. But obviously self-compassion is a huge focus. Yeah. And so we did, I had never, I'd done self-compassion is a huge focus. And so I had never done self-compassion practices before and compassion practices before, but it was a little bit of a side interest, not the main dish.

So for 10 days, we did nothing with that and actually filmed a lot of it because we're going to use it in the 10% happier app. Anyway, at the beginning, she was saying, you know, when you're sending compassion to yourself, you know, maybe you put your hand on your heart and I was like, there is no, I love this spring, but there's no way I'm doing that. And then by day five or six, there was a moment.

And I'm embarrassed to say it was on camera, probably because I think it happened repeatedly, where I was, I noticed something coming up, maybe some of my inner repeated hobgoblins are sort of a rushing sense, you know, in patients, and a suffering that comes from like not wanting to be here right now and looking forward to the next thing. And then also a lot of self criticism like, oh, wow, you were just off your game for the last 10 minutes or you have some memory surfaces of me being horrible in some one way. And I actually did say, all right, it's okay.

And put my hand, I felt my hand go to my heart. And when I noticed this is actually there, once I was, once all the inner chatter had come down because I was on retreat and I didn't have a lot to think about. And I was more aware of what was going on. When I felt bad, it actually manifested in the area around my heart. So they actually hurt there. So anyway, yeah, you're right. I'm not the kind of guy traditionally

who would hug himself. And yet here I was on this retreat with my hand on my heart sending myself well wishes. Right. And I would, I would, you know, I'm reluctant to admit that publicly but here we are. I do admit it publicly because I think actually it will be useful for other men who would resist this type of thing. Right. Yeah. And so and also we so for instance we teach

the difference between loving kindness and compassion. You know there are two sides of the same coin but loving kindness more general wishing yourself well to be happy and peaceful. Compassion is specifically, by definition, aimed at suffering, aimed at pain. So one practice we teach, which is actually very useful, is if you're feeling something difficult, maybe anger or fear or sadness or grief or confusion, to the extent that you can locate it in your

body, and that's one of the gifts of mindfulness practice, is the ability to actually physically see that great new study by Richie Davidson that found that the ability to actually know where the emotion is manifested in your body. So this is a congruence between knowing what you're feeling and where it is in your body, that that internet itself leads to well-being. It's called inter-reception. Well inter-reception is actually the ability to feel things in your body, but I forget they call it something about a two-man.

I'm sorry, just came out like two days ago, I haven't read it closely. But the ability to feel your difficult emotions as a bodily sensation and track. When I'm more anxious, my body feels this way. When I'm, you know, so just track the changes in your body as kind of attuned with your body as a manifestation of your emotions. It's actually, it's a really useful skill. But anyway, so if you have- I'm actually going to say that for me as a meditator, that happened quickly. Yes. That I just, instead of being fully engulfed and overwhelmed by an emotion for me, mostly anger or self-pity, I was switching to noticing how it felt.

Right. Okay. And so, what you can do if you can just put a hand wherever that emotion is experienced, might be in your gut, might be in your throat, might be in your head, it might be in your throat, it might be in your head, it may be in your heart, it almost doesn't matter. And then so what happens is when you put a warm hand here, again, part of this is just physiology. You know, just think about it.

When babies are born, they have no language. Touch for human beings is great research on touch in the care system. Touch is one of the primary access points for compassion, for feeling safe, for feeling cared for. Our whole parasympathetic nervous system is very closely linked to touch. And so, you know, it's sad because yes, it is touchy-feely, but none the less. Literally, but as human beings, that's the way we're designed physiologically. So there are other ways to access it, but it seems ashamed to miss out on that really powerful tool just because it feels uncomfortable because as human beings, that's the way our bodies and our brains are designed.

We're designed to react to touch. And also tone of voice. I was just going to say, this is why I think you designed to react to touch. And also tone of voice. I was just going to say, this is why I think you're, to hold that thought, but I wouldn't give you a compliment. This is why I think you're such a successful communicator on this, because you do have a style that is a little touchy-feely, but you back it up with so many basic biological and scientific facts that even

somebody like me who has such a powerful allergy to that kind of style, I have to listen. Well, thank you. Well, I think in some ways that's the integration of the masculine and feminine, right? So sadly, why do we not like touchy-feely because it's kind of seen to be feminine qualities and science and hard logic is supposed to be a masculine quality and to succeed we're supposed to be masculine and I'm both. And that's both simultaneously. That's kind of we all are. But here's the thing is men are socialized. They aren't allowed to be in touch with the kind of more warm,

you know, I said earlier, I'm kind of referring to this as the in and young of self-compassion. There's the receptive tender side and there's also the action-oriented kind of more fearsite. Both are necessary for all human beings. I really work hard to integrate both, to honor both. But in work context, the young, the kind of masculine is honored and valued at the more feminine isn't, and that's a real disadvantage to women. But the way men suffer is because in the relational field, they're socialized not to be in touch with those more tender size. And that hurts men too. Yes. And so we're all being harmed by not being able to be our true authentic cells, which is

both masculine and feminine, both active and passive, both receptive and goal oriented. These essential dialectic, we need both simultaneously all the time. And I think maybe that's what you're picking up on when saying I'm a touchy-fili scientist You know, I'm integrating my left and right brain and both are really important. I feel oh, yeah, I mean I Think about I don't know if I'm gonna get this quote right but Seven a salasse who's a teacher. I really was a friend and a teacher teacher I really like. She also teaches a lot on the 10% happier app. And so she has mentioned something like,

you think you're thinking your thoughts, this is a quote she's used to taking from somebody else, but you think you're thinking your thoughts, but you're actually thinking the culture's thoughts. That's right. And so for me, I don't wanna think of myself as sexist because obviously that's one of the worst things you can be in our world society right now.

And yet, obviously, this allergy I have to the touchy-feely is sexist in many ways. And we are socialized to be that way. Because the feminine has less power, that's one of the outcomes of patriarchy. Is this side of human nature, when it's devalued by patriarchy, is this side of human nature when it's devalued by patriarchy, it means that, so not you, Dan, as person, but in terms of the larger cultural context, which is operated in you unconsciously. You're choosing to be this way,

but when you think touchy-feely, what it's triggering is less powerful. If I'm touchy-feely, I'm less powerful because I'm moving more toward the feminine where there's less power. And that's damaging to men. Yeah, I guess consciously, I'm not thinking that consciously. I know, you aren't.

I know, you aren't. You aren't consciously doing it. Yeah. So you ask what we know about it and biases. They're all implicit. They're all unconscious. Whether it's about race or gender. These things are operating outside of our awareness. And one of the beautiful things about mindfulness

is that it does give us more clarity. I mean, we've talked about it a lot on this show, and I know it's sort of a little bit off topic for what you've come here to discuss, but bringing into the sunlight, which is a painful process of embarrassing, humiliating, CEO, wow, wow, I just reached this snap judgment about somebody based on their pigmentation that's pretty negative.

And that's in you, if you can see that, and as you said before, not take it personally, then you're not owned by it, and then you're avoiding a whole many, many worst mistakes. Yes, exactly, but that's why you also need to sit this up again, this is the in and the young, the young kind of gives us the clarity and it's kind of the slightly more masculine energy, but you also have to be kind to yourself. You didn't choose to be prejudice. It's not like I signed up for a Yang, I wanted to be prejudice. This is part of the larger culture, and so you have to be able to hold the pain.

So these two, this dialectic of self-compassion, so the Yin energy allows us to kind of be with ourselves in a compassionate way, to kind of validate ourselves, to accept ourselves as we are. It's very powerful, it's especially powerful for dealing with shame. How do you hold shame? Shame drives so much negative behavior, so much destructive behavior. People can't even begin to touch their shame so they act out, they start shooting people.

I mean, it's really destructive. And actually, there's a little bit of gender and shame as well because it manifests differently, but a lot of men's behavior, what we know psychologically, is driven by the avoidance of shame, right? How do you hold shame that intense pain? You have to hold it with kindness. You know, hey, this is part of being human. Everyone feels this.

Everyone's imperfect. Everyone makes mistakes. You know, the mess of shame, we need to hold it with compassion. And so the healing power of self-compassion is more part of the, you know, it's not totally either orbit, it's part more part of the inside you know, it's not totally either orbit, it's part more part of the

inside, the kind of being with ourselves and a kind, accepting warm way, loving way, if I can use that word as a scientist, but it is, it's an expression of love. But then there's also the action side. You know, think of a firefighter who jumps into a birding building to save people who are, you know, about to go up in flames, or service men and women who actually risks their own lives to protect people, that is an ultimate act of compassion. But it's the other side of it, it's taking action. Or a coach who motivates the kid to achieve their goals,

or teachers, or people who work three jobs to put food on their table for their kids, all these stem from care. But sometimes care requires being with acceptance, sometimes care requires taking action to try to alleviate suffering. And that's not even more the young side of self-compassion. But people, first of all, that confuse, they don't realize it's there and that's why they think it's weak, that's why they think it's selfish confuse they don't realize it's there and that's why they think it's weak That's why they think it's selfish. They don't realize that it also has these action qualities And then and then that's where gender comes in all right, so a man

Aren't allowed to be in and women aren't allowed to be young We all need both so we're kind of both messed up because of it You know and so self-compassion is a way to hold all of it. You can hold the pain of things like patriarchy. I'm not sure you don't want to be patriarchal, but you're a white man. And so you know, can you didn't choose to be this way, but this is part of the larger culture that's actually encoded in your brain patterns. So how do you deal with that?

First of all, you have to have a lot of kindness, you have to have a lot of forgiveness, you have to have a lot of acceptance, and you have to be able to touch the pain of it. And I'm sure that my colleague, Chris Gurmur, we were talking about this issue and he just is a white male. He broke down and cried because he touched the pain of that. He's such a kind guy. And when he really opened to the pain of his own privilege, you know, it was just, yeah, it was really touching. But because he, he developed all these self-compassion practices with me, he was able to hold it.

So he didn't have to defend himself. He didn't have to pretend, oh, it's not there. I don't know, I'm not privileged. He could open to it. And then you have to open to the pain, the end, hold it with kindness before you can take action, which is the yang and do something about it. And both are really needed. And the flip side is for women, and I'm a woman.

So my next book is actually, I'm gonna be called, Fierce Compassion for Women. It's kind of, I think women really need to cultivate this Yang energy. We need to protect ourselves. We need to say, no more, we're gonna stop subordinating our needs.

No, you can't sexually harass me. No, you can't abuse me. No, you can't pay me less. No, you can't abuse me. No, you can't pay me less. No, it has to be more equal. I'm not just going to give up everything that's valuable to me, to meet other people's needs, that socialization. You may call me names, but I'm not going to buy it. Women really need to rise up and claim their power, which

has been stripped for them in large part because they aren't allowed to have this more yang energy. And so everyone really needs both. And I think a beautiful thing about compassion is it is both. There's mama and there's mama bear. Right. You know, on this Yang or Yang or whatever Yang, go with Yang, a version of sort of fierce self-compassion, I think of my wife, I'll have to ask her permission if we're going to post this for to talk about her. But let's just assume for the second, for the moment that I do have her permission,

I'm going to write down. Okay, ask permission again. Because it's personal. I watch with her dealing, I don't think we've referred to it as struggling with the yang side of self-compassion, but I do watch her struggle with how to draw boundaries with me, with our son, with her bosses. And she's really uncomfortable with it.

And then sometimes maybe she feels she takes it too far and is overly harsh. And like, high training that is really tricky. And I have compassion for that. Yeah. And so, you know, I'm similar. So I'm a successful academic. And usually in many, any male-dominated feel, to be successful, you've got to really draw

on your young side, you know, your kind of more masculine and competitive, strong side. We get called names for it. This is the double-bind woman or end to succeed. We have to be young, but we aren't personally liked when we're young. People like us when we're young, but we can't succeed. You know, and so that's why I just do it with a double-buying. I don't care. I'm going to do it anyway. But see, this is the thing.

If you use that energy, the drawing boundaries, or the protecting yourself, or saying, no, I need to do my needs, if you do it from a place of care, we further do it. It's carrying force. You're being forceful, but it's not aggressive. It's not personal. You're being forceful, but it's not aggressive. It's not personal. You aren't blaming people. You're just the force that mom of their energy

comes from a very pure loving place of care and kindness. And when you remember that, when you integrate both energies, then it's clean. Then you don't just explode. You know, you can target it as they know that's not OK, but it just means that you aren't okay, but no, that behavior is not okay. And so, when integration is allowed to occur, it just works a lot better. It's also a lot more effective, you know. But we're going to have to confront gender roles in order for both men and women to be able to be our full authentic selves because there's so much

pain in the world, you know. More 10% happier after this. Life is short and it's full of a lot of interesting questions. What does happiness really mean? How do I get the most out of my time here on Earth? And what really is the best cereal? These are the questions I seek to resolve on my weekly podcast, Life is Short, with Justin Long. If you're looking for the answer to deep philosophical questions like, what is the meaning of life? I can't really help you. But I do believe that we really enrich our experience here by learning from others. And that's why in each episode, I like to talk with actors, musicians, artists, scientists, and many more types of people about how they get the most out of

life. We explore how they felt during the highs and sometimes more importantly, the lows of their careers. We discuss how they've been able to stay happy during some of the harder times. But if I'm being honest, it's mostly just fun chats between friends about the important stuff. Like if you had a sandwich named after you, what would be on it? Follow life is short wherever you get your podcasts. You can also listen to ad free on the Amazon music or Wondering app. I owe you something which is at some point I cut us off and sent

to you off and sent us down a tangent. Okay. You were about to say something about tone of voice. Oh, yes. All right. So what we know from the research, and this is a lot, you've probably interviewed Docker Kelton, or from UC Berkeley.

I have, he's not been on the show. Docker Kelton or Docker Kelton, I don't know how to pronounce the name, but it's, it's Brian Suther cracker, Docker, Brian Suther cracker. Docker Kelton, okay. So Docker, I did a piece on him for nightline about 10 years ago.

He runs a, a, a, a, a, a, a, on him for nightline about 10 years ago. He runs a... It's a great, a good center. The greater good center and also basically a lab that studies compassion, not just self-compatient, but all... Yeah, all compassion. Yeah, really cool guy. I've actually really eager to have him on the show so that he should have me be great. He should have me be great.

Come to New York. Yeah, but yeah, so he's doing some great research on this, basically the triggers of the care system, the triggers of compassion. And so there are different ones, so touch we talked about, touch is a powerful trigger, but tone of voice. So his research shows that around the world universally,

regardless of what culture you go to, is the same sound of compassion, which is, I'm gonna ask you to do it down, what's the sound of compassion? So if I'm talking to my son and he's heard himself. Yeah, or yeah, if anyone was heard, what would you naturally say? Are you okay, dude?

No, what's the sound without words? Make a sound, the sound. Ah, yeah. Around, there's not a single culture where it's like, woohoo, your heart is not like, it's a pic of a mung-mung life teenage boys, we would laugh at each other if we were hurt. So the passion part of our brain had not felt so much. But as it expressed, so there's a particular sound and there's some term for it that kind of up and down and animals do it too.

Again, this is part of our physiology. Remember, when we come out of the womb, we don't have language. So those first couple of years of life are so important. This is where our whole attachment system is formed preverbally. So what are our communicators that we're saved from we're loved and cared for, things like touch and tone of voice. Also gaze is another one, and there's a little less research on gaze,

but tone of voice. So for some people, maybe they don't say particularly harsh things to themselves, but their tone is really cold. So warming up the tone, you know. And internally, for yourself. the tone, you know, internally, internally. You can actually, it's not just what you say, it's how you say it. It's also your body posture. Is your body posture tense? Like are you being tense and tight with yourself and kind of cold?

Are you being more relaxed and more warm with yourself? And that's why I made the joke earlier that it's about warming things up, as opposed to cooling to be more cool. There is something about warmth. This is just our physiology. We need to... It's not a mental practice. Compassion is not a mental practice, compassion is not a mental practice, there's

a mental component, but it's really an embodied practice. It's about feeling. It's about, often when we teach people self-compassion, we say, see if you can just kind of drop out of your head and your mind and the storyline and just drop into your body. And what we're doing in a way is, if you want to be scientific about it, it's the parasympathetic nervous system. We're calming down, our cortisol is reducing, you know, and the luscious adrenaline, our heart rate becomes more variable, more flexible, oxytocin is being released, and this is actually

an embodied experience. And so that's why I think it's really useful to come to self-combation, not just to the mind, just the words are important as one path we end, but you can actually approach it as an embodied practice. So we've now teed me up to finally get to how to practice. Okay, how do you get to how you do it? So it seems I'm guessing, based on, I'm not guessing. Based on my experience, there are kind of two ways. One is the formals seated or practice, and the other is free range on the go practice. In formal, yeah, yeah. And so what we find actually in our research, so we've developed this training program called

the Mindful Self-Compassion Program, And we find it doesn't matter which one you do. They're both effective. So you can sit in meditation. We know that loving kindness, meditation increases self-compassion. We have other meditations like using the breath as a way to kind of calm and soothe yourself. Or we actually teach a practice where we tailor the phrases to be a little more aimed at your pain because loving kindness, sometimes it can be hard to throw friendly wishes when you're just in a lot of pain. You can actually, with compassion, you need to turn toward the pain directly and just kind of validate that it hurts, that kind of kind of,

that type of attitude for the pain. So you can do that in city meditation, but there are a lot of informal practices. So we do teach people to find a touch that feels supportive. Hand on heart works are about 50% of people, about 50% it doesn't. Some people, like hands on the solar plexus, some people like putting a hand on your face, some people just holding their own hand.

I mean, people have to find a way in the type of touch that works. That's one way. Learning to speak to yourself in a more friendly and supportive manner. For many people, the best way is to think about what would I say to a close friend who I really cared about, who was going through the exact same situation I'm in. What would I more naturally say, especially if I was at my most compassionate? What would I say to support them, to help them, to let them know that I cared about them in their time of struggle?

So you can use that as a template for yourself. You can also imagine what an ideally compassionate person would say to you or a spiritual figure. If people say, what would Jesus say? In a way, what would Jesus say in a way, what would Jesus say is a self-compassion practice? You know, can I model my inner dialogue based on what I would imagine someone like Jesus would say? You know, so it can work with religion, it can also be separate from it. A compassionate letter writing, you'll probably like this. There was one study that showed if you wrote a self-compassionate letter for seven days straight, it reduced depression for three months and increased happiness for six months, right? That very simple act. I think there's a lot of reasons of how it

operates. One thing you're perspective taking is that it'd be lost in the pain. You're stepping outside of yourself and doing perspective taking and saying, wow, you're really having a hard time. Is there anything I can do to help? By doing that, you're disidentifying with the pain, which in and of itself is powerful. That's kind of the mindfulness. But then you're also adding the sense of connectedness. Hey, it happens to everyone. Imperfection is the human experience.

It's not just you. You know, when we forget that, when we make a mistake or we get that call from the doctor, we think, something has gone wrong. This is the plan I signed up for. Everyone else is being perfect. It has a perfect life, and it's just me who's struggling. So, reminding yourself of common humanity,

this is normal, and this is part of being human. You aren't alone. And then the kindness, right? The warmth, the kindness, the care aspect. All three elements are really important. So another way you can practice self-compassion is just reminding yourself of those three components. We have something called the self-compassion break.

First, you use mindfulness. You just remember, wow, this is, I'm struggling. You might think that's obvious. It's really not. A lot of people aren't even aware that they're struggling. They're so lost in the struggle or trying to fix the struggle or, you know, they don't have any perspective. They're totally identified with it. They can't help themselves when they're lost in the pain. So first is mindfulness. Oh, I see. This is a moment where I'm really having a tough time. And then you remind yourself of common humanity.

Well, this is part of life. It's not just me. It's not abnormal to be struggling. The sense of isolation that we get when we fall into the illusion that everyone else is perfect and we aren't, it's debilitating. They say, evolutionary biology, alone monkey is a dead monkey. So they're feeling isolated because we've made a mistake. It's really, really detrimental.

So remember, hey, this is part of how we learn. This is normal. It's natural. There's nothing wrong to make a mistake. And then bringing in the kindness. What can I say to let myself know that even though I'm struggling, I care, I'm there for myself, I can support myself, I'm not going to abandon myself. Think about that. Don't we do that? We abandon ourselves. We're struggling. Our minds don't even go there. We have this ability when we're in pain to actually give ourselves care, support and kindness. And we just abandon it.

We don't even use it. We just, we, it's like this, we've got this incredible, powerful tool. All you need to do is remember to use it. And we don't. And so you can just think, well, what am I really good friend to me say? What am I really good friend say to me right now? Or what would I say to a really good friend right now? Or what would Jesus say, whatever image you have of compassion,

just remembering the kindness when you put those three together? So these are the three components of self-compassion in my model, the mindfulness, the common humanity, and the kindness. But if you want to talk about how it feels in a moment to vian, self-compassion, it feels like loving connected presence. You're holding your pain in loving connected presence. Right?

But sometimes the pain is because you need to protect yourself. It's different. It feels like fierce and powered clarity. This is not okay. I'm going to stand together with my brothers and sisters, and I'm going to protect yourself. It's different. It feels like fierce and powered clarity. This is not okay. I'm going to stand together with my brothers and sisters and I'm going to say no. Me too. Me too. Exactly. And so the face, the manifestation of this caring force may vary, but it's all coming from the same place. And mindfulness and compassion are kind of, they aren't exactly the same, because again, they have the slightly different targets,

but it's part of the same dance. At some point, it's just open heart-mind. And when your heart is open and your mind is open, you are connected with everything. So you just, you talked about a lot of approaches we could take, but I'm still, I'm just wondering for the listener here, many of whom are med, many if not all of whom are meditators. Can you, can you describe how we would do self-compassion as part of our meditations factors, which I would only imagine, right, fuels the ability to do it off.

I mean, we know meditation is one of the best ways you can actually train your brain and change your neural structure. So it's very powerful. It's not the only way to do it. It's equally important to integrate it in your daily life. But so if you're meditating, so for instance, we teach meditation

in the mindful self-compassion program. Some is like what you do when your mind wanders. You can use the wandery mind as an opportunity for self-compassion. So not only do you notice that your mind is wandered, you might actually use that to say, ah, just imagine your mind is like a little toddler who wandered off. Can you just hold the hand of that toddler, gently bring it back to where it's supposed to be?

Of course it wanders, you know, that's what it does, but I can still be kind to the wandering mind. You can actually use any sort of frustration that occurs in practice, so you fall asleep, you can't focus, you know, whatever you aren't in that lovely, peaceful state that people like, you can use that as an opportunity to practice compassion. Give yourself some kindness and acceptance and remember that this is just part of the human experience.

So that's one way you can do it. You can also, for instance, the breath, the breath can be used to kind of calm the mind and settle the mind as a focus of attention. But there's also quality to the breath, the breath can be used to kind of calm the mind and settle the mind as a focus of attention. But there's also quality to the breath that you can focus in on. The breath itself can be very soothing, very comforting. Paul Gilbert actually talks about the soothing rhythm of the breath.

You can actually notice it. It's a strange way in which it's this internal rocking motion that you can rest in. You can lie yourself to be cared for by the breath. So that's another just little slant on it. You can use to activate this. Another practice, my favorite practice, is again using the breath, we imagine that we're breathing with each in breathbreath, you're

breathing in compassion for yourself and with each out-breath, you breathe out compassion for others. It's a derivation of the Tibetan tongue-lamp. Tibetan tongue-lamp, but that practice is a little more, it's a beautiful practice, but you breathe in suffering of the world and you transform it and you breathe out compassion. So if your aim is to actually cultivate self-compassion, we find it's actually a little more useful, a little less challenging. Just breathe in for yourself. This is hard for me, breathe out for others. This is a really good practice for caregivers. We teach doctors and nurses or teachers.

It's hard. These jobs are hard. It's hard to care for others. I feel burnt out. I feel overwhelmed. Breathing compassion for yourself. It's hard to feel this empathic distress. It's hard to do what I do. I feel overwhelmed. I feel burnt out.

Breathing compassion for yourself. Validate your own pain. And then when you breathe out, breathe out compassion for the person you're caring for, they're struggling too. And the nice thing about breathing compassion in and out is it's very connecting. It's a practice that's very connecting.

Good breath in, breath out. You can focus a little more on yourself if your pain is more salient or focus more on the other if their pain is more salient. But this idea that it's this flow, inward and outward, that's why it's a really nice practice. All these meditations I have on my website, people can access them. What's the website?

Aselfcompassion.org. If you Google Self Compassion, you'll find me. Nice. We'll also put it in the show. Yeah, okay. But what about the repetition of phrases? Like, may I be happy? Yeah. So loving kindness. We do teach loving kindness. So again, my colleague, Chris Grimmer, I think he's brilliant. He developed a way of helping people find personally meaningful phrases that really help to the things that they need to hear. The standard phrases are fine and they work for a lot of people, but you know, may be safe, may be peaceful, may be healthy, may live with these.

If you're devastated because you've just lost your son or something like that, it feels kind of a little incongruent to say, may be safe, may be happy, may be peaceful, may live with these. And it's actually, so actually, you guys people through an exercise where you actually think, what do I need to hear right now? If I had someone who could whisper in my ear

in this moment exactly what I need to hear, what would that be? And then you use that as your phrase. So it's a little more personalized. It also can be a little more targeted toward if what you need to hear is addressing the real pain you're in. Then you can, you know, accept myself as I am, you know, may you can, you know, you may accept myself as I am, you know,

may support myself, you know, I'm okay. Whatever it is you need to hear, you actually personalize your phrases to touch that directly. So that's one way we kind of work with the loving kindness practice. How has this practice played? I mean, you got interested in self-compassion.

There was something that Zen teacher and Berkeley low these many years said about self-compassion that turned you on and has become your livelihood, your career. How has it played out in your life? You mentioned a son, you have a son who has good needs. How has this all worked for you? Yeah, well, yeah, so I talk a lot about my son, because he's really my best teacher. So, yeah, so my son is autistic, and I had about seven years of pretty dedicated self-compassion practice under my belt by the time he got diagnosed. And I can't even imagine how I would have gotten through without, I would have, but it helped me tremendously. So it helped me both not only the mindfulness practice of accepting my feelings, you know,

allowing the grief to be there, allowing the feelings of disappointment to be there without judging them, without making them go away, but what really helped was in addition to that, giving myself that it's really hard, it what really helped was in addition to that, giving myself that we know is really hard. It feels really hard. You know, I would actually give myself that love, that kindness, that care, especially like when he was having a year splitting tantrum. You know, even though he's in pain, I made sure he was safe, but that's when I would do

my breathing in compassion practice. I would just, this is so hard, Breathing for me, this is so hard. I feel overwhelmed. I don't know what to do. I want to jump out of a window. And the kind of gave myself that love and support and that care. And then I was able to also breathe out for him. So that allowed me to stay connected in those moments, whether than just focusing on him

or just being overwhelmed. So, it's really helped me in that practice. Just really everything I've gone through, I mean, at this point, self-compassion has become a habit. Occasionally, yes, sure, thoughts will come up, feelings of failure and stuff come up and there's pain. But now, my habit is to just recognize it as pain and to do whatever I need to do to be there for myself in the moment.

Again, whether that's, I need some acceptance, some yin, some soothing, some comforting, some validating, or whether that's action. You know, it's helped me, you might say, well, you know, so I'm an academic. And there's been some struggles in my academic career as well. It's really helped me the fact that I can integrate the care with the taking action. It's helped me be more stable and more balanced, even in times of challenge. of challenge. I'm still a mess. Don't get me wrong yet. I'm still a mess. But I am a compassionate mess. It's an achievable goal. I mean that's the beauty of it. I sometimes I joke I'm glad I'm a compassionate teacher. I'm not a mindfulness

teacher. Because I don't always have equanimity. I'm not always aware. I get lost, but I can pretty quickly now. I'm in the habit of whatever pain, whatever mess is happening. I just hold that with compassion. That's the name of your book, by the way, compassionate mess. That's the name. I was thinking that. I think it's going to be fierce, self-compassion for women, but I'm also like the idea of compassionate mess.

It's a really nice idea, it kind of explains what it is, and that actually is the call, Rob Nairn actually said that. Message to your editor. Okay, the book might be more likely to pick up an airport. But that's right, but remember my books for women. I know. I think women, I know a lot of women. I've sold a lot of books to women. Okay, so we can, we can so we can maybe have two titles. But I love that phrase, because it just really captures it. So high-celled esteem is not an achievable goal.

Maybe not even a desirable goal. Yeah, exactly. But compassionate mess is, and when you hold things and compassion, anything becomes workable. That's the thing, it becomes workable. And you can actually learn, it sounds strange, but you actually learn to rest your awareness in the loving connected presence in the compassion,

holding the pain as opposed to your awareness being identified with the pain. So let's walk me through that. So how this works in a moment in your mind for you. So for me I have lots of I don't want to guess at what your little, you know, daily Thorns in your side maybe but for me it's like I have the whole Self-critical thing around I have more

Around belly fat that I want to have. I'm skinny eye, but I wish I had the abs I had in my mid 30s. Now, well, coming up in 48 and they're not there anymore in any discernible way. And so every time I pass a reflective surface when I was just at the beach for a week with my family, there was a lot of like, oh my God, looking at myself. So what in that moment, how would things work? So, okay, so, and this is why the three components of mindfulness, common humanity and kindness are helpful because they're actually, it's almost like a little mini instruction guide of what to do. So first, it has to always start with mindfulness. Mindfulness is the foundation.

You've got to notice that hurts. Instead of being lost in the thought that I wish I had to have a six pack, it's like the pain of that. That's, you know, that's, that's hurts. Whether or not it should hurt, whether or not, you know, whatever. The fact it doesn't matter because it does hurt. So you look in the mirror, oh wow, that's painful. I mean, look, I'm 52. You know, I'm past my prime. That's not fun.

You know, it's, but it's the reality, right? So you look in the mirror and you say, oh my God, I'm getting jowls or whatever it is. So identifying the pain of it, right? So you look in the mirror and you say, Oh my God, I've gotten jowls or whatever it is. So identifying the pain of it, right? And then the common humanity, right? Just remember, well, this is, it's part of being human. It's part of aging. Everyone, you know, nothing's last forever. This is actually part of the human experience. There was no human being alive that didn't get older. These things their body didn't start changing. That's not what it means to be human.

It's not just me. There's a tendency in the moment to think that every other man in the world, they're all GQ supermodels, aren't they? They all have the sense back. I have some friends who are older than me who are ripped. That's on my mind. Yeah, okay.

But they too, they too eventually, you know, they'll get old and they'll die. Sorry to break the news, Dan. I'm well aware of that news. I'm just what's happening cognitively for me is I know I'm going to die. I know everybody, I know it's going to die, but I feel too young to be at that point. Right, right. Okay. So, but so nonetheless, so maybe some people, that's maybe your friends who manage to keep the six pack at age 50, whatever, maybe that's not their particular thing they struggle with. But surely it's something. Human experience is about we struggle with our imperfection.

The human experience is not about perfection. That's an Instagram illusion. You know, really, isn't it true? Yeah, maybe it's not, maybe it's not autism, but it's something else. Maybe it's not that they don't have a six pack, but it's something else. Everyone struggles in their own way. I thought about starting an Instagram account of only of my son's tantrums. Right. Yeah. So, but so what you're really opening to, it's not your opening to a particular thing, you're opening to the just the fact of human imperfection.

It's normal. You know, this is, you know, you aren't abnormal. It's nothing bad or wrong about not having a six back. You know, again, if you want to, that's fine. If that's your goal, there's nothing wrong with it. But just remembering that, you know, that you're human-ness, remembering your human-ness. Letting go of the idea of perfection, which is false and an illusion, causes a lot of suffering, but it's false and it's an illusion.

Just opening to the reality that human-mean-humanism about me will freak you know that, to reminding yourself of it. And then... I know it in theory. I know it for other people You know it. Yeah, so so you but you forget it Right, it's not that you you know it and but you don't in the moment you've forgotten it It feels like a recipe for complacency. It feels like and I know you're gonna rebut this

But let me just play out the string. Yes, I it feels to me especially as it pertains to the belly Okay, I can't believe we're dwelling this long-hown mind I just can play with the string. It feels to me, especially as it pertains to the belly, I can't believe we're dwelling this long-hown mind. That's what it looks like. It's good, it's good, it's nice. That, you know, like, if I hit the gym harder, or if I hadn't eaten half of my son's plate of french fries, this wouldn't be this way.

Right, okay. So what you're doing in that moment is you're kind of falling into the illusion of complete self-control. It's actually, we aren't able to control things that have to be perfect. Now, if it really is important to you and also you feel healthier and stronger, absolutely, go to the gym, do more sit-ups. If it's important to you and it's an important goal and if it's going to make you happy and

it's going to help you, we leave the suffering, you know, then you bring in the kindness. The kindness could go a couple of ways depending on what you need. The kindness maybe, you know, I just, I really feel so much better in my body if I did more sets it up. What can I do? Maybe I can make it easier for myself. Like, me, I hire my, I pay my yoga teacher to come to me so they actually go to class. You know, if it's important to you and you think it'll help alleviate your suffering or make you healthy, be well, you find creative ways maybe thinking about it differently. You know, what's not working in my routine now, how I can be different. That may be a way you go.

And maybe at some point that the way you go is, well, I'm just going to accept it. Again, it's, acceptance or change. You change, it's a matter of wisdom, right? What's the right action to take? And I can't tell you the wise thing to do. But the thing is that getting down on yourself and shaming yourself and feeling bad about yourself or not having the six pack you want, here's what happens, right? And maybe let me know if this is true. You think that in the moment and you feel bad about yourself.

And then because you feel bad about yourself, boy, that glass of wine looks pretty nice. You know, you want to comfort yourself to kind of counteract your feeling bad about yourself. And it actually ends up working against you. Shame is not the best motivating force. Wouldn't you agree? When you're feeling it, emotionally, I will agree. When you're full of shame,

there isn't really get up and go out of here. No, but there's some like a dry, I'd sort of clear-eyed analysis of deficiencies does help. Absolutely. That's the mindfulness. That's the clear scene. Constructive criticism is incredibly helpful. Kindness leads to constructive criticism.

Judgment and shame leads to harsh, destructive criticism. We know for a fact that constructive criticism is more helpful than just saying you're a fat loser. Who does that help? So again, the motivational power of it is because it hurts so much to call yourself a fat loser, you have some motivation to try to avoid that self-whip, but at the end of the day, it's probably going to undermine your efforts because you're going to be so feel so bad about yourself. You're going to have that extra glass of wine or that piece of chocolate

cake. But thinking, wow, actually, this will make me happy. I can see clearly. I could open to the pain of it. How can I constructively do something different to help myself achieve my goal? So that, so that, and that's the kindness. That's the kind of, right. So that's the kind of, that's the third part. Right.

Kindness is not, yeah, kindness sometimes, I remember kindness can be yin or yang. Kindness sometimes says, you know, it's time I just have to accept it, but the kindness also might be the young. Okay, what can change a big things better? How can I help you? How can I help you reach your, you know, you'd say to yourself, how can I help myself reach my goals in an effective realistic manner? And, and, and the warmth and feelings of safety are actually going to be more supportive if you are being able to reach your goals than just shame and lots of dumping lots of negative feelings on yourself. It actually pulling the rug out beneath yourself doesn't ultimately help very much.

So we got a little off track, but it's important that these three elements, we need to be mindful. Mindfulness is the core. We need to be aware. We need to remember our connectedness. We aren't alone. The feelings of isolation, again, is one of the most psychologically debilitating states we can be in when we feel all alone. So you need to remember our connectedness in this struggle of human life and our connectedness

in the mess. I'm not the only compassionate mess where we're all messes. You're a mess, I'm a mess, everyone's a mess. You know, that's just part of being human. And then the kindness, and how might that kindness manifest? Sometimes the kindness is tough love. Sometimes the kindness is accepting love. Sometimes the kindness is encouragement. Sometimes the kindness is accepting love. Sometimes the kindness is encouragement. Sometimes the kindness is, you know, I just really need, I'm overworked, I need to cut back on my hours so I have more time to work life balance. You know, again, wisdom knows what the right thing to do is, but what's important is the friendliness, that intention, the kindness, the kindness is always aimed at helping, alleviating

suffering, you know. kindness, the kindness is always aimed at helping alleviating suffering. So you can actually just go through those steps. And it's a very easy thing to do. You can do in the moment. I teach, we teach something called the self-compassion break where you find language that works for you because people are really different. And once you get phrases that work for you, it's almost like a mantra and you can just repeat those phrases. Sometimes you, some's almost like a mantra and you can just repeat those phrases

Sometimes you some touch can just automatically set it off Right, you can use the breath. There's lots of different ways and so I think in my self-compassion I've got I think we have 37 different practices, you know some work for some people some don't But it I think it's really worth spending the time But I think it's really worth spending the time to find out what works for you. I'm talking to you as a human being right now. If you struggle with this, you know, what works for you? What doorway actually opens that door to this loving connected presence, to this feeling of oneness, this feeling of well-being, this feeling of care.

You want that, we all want that, we all want that, we're human beings. So what doorways open that for you? And it's actually worth spending some time asking that question. There's no right or wrong answer. But once you start habitually entering that doorway, that door becomes easier and easier to open. It's incredibly intriguing and attractive, and probably not going to land it right now, but I do think.

Well, you already have a meditation practice. Yes. So, it's just a matter of just kind of reminding yourself that it's not just about the awareness. It's also about the connectedness and it's about the care, about the warmth. Yeah, I think I just need the little phrase that gets me in that door. Yes, exactly. And what that phrase is, you know, only you know, really. No, but it's a great thing to think about and explore.

There are two questions I want to ask before I go, both of which can be short if you want. But that's up to you. One of them is, is there something I should have asked, but didn't? We covered a lot of ground, didn't we? I think we're okay. I think we covered a broad range of it. Cool. Then the final question is, I always do this kind of semi-facitious thing at the end, which is ask people to step into what I call the plug zone. Can you unabashedly plug, and I'm giving you permission here to plug everything, all the resources that are out there, where you are in social media, blah, blah, blah again.

Yeah, yeah. So I can, because I can say, basically the last 10 years of my life with my colleague, Chris Grimer, we've been developing the technology. He's actually connected with Harvard, it's Boston, but we've been developing the technology of how to teach self-compassion. It's not just a good idea.

We know the technology, the pedagogy, of how to help people be more self-compassionate. And it was developed in the Mindful Self-Compassion program. And it's not all over the world. You could either go to the Center for MSC and find a teacher. You can take it online.

But the cool thing is our workbook just came out in August. It was a number one bestseller. But the workbook has it all in there, and it's only like, you know, 15 bucks or something, and actually it guides you through in the sequence, and it helps you do all the practices safely. It's a very accessible way to access these practices, the Mindful Self-Compassion Workbook. And, you know, a year ago that one year had been available, you would have just had to have someone in your area, you would have spent a lot

more time and money to learn the practices. And now it's just one click away. Cool. And your website again is self-compassion. Self-compassion.org. Yeah. And do you have a Twitter or Instagram or anything like that? I do have a Twitter. I have someone who tweets for me. I'm embarrassed to say it or remember what Twitter handle is. No, I think that's a badge of honor. I can send it to you. I'm also on Facebook, but probably the easiest way place to go is if you just Google self-compassion, because I've got videos, I've got a TED talk, I've got, you can take your own self-compassion,

you can test your own self-compassion level with the scale. I've got, for those of you science nerds, Slystein, I've got the original PDFs of probably like well over a thousand articles research on self-compassion organized by category. I put a lot of work into this to try to facilitate the research. So if you want to know what it's been done with self-compassion and body image issues, I've got a section on self-compassion and body image with all the original PDFs of the scientific

articles. So if you're a scientist, that's a place to go. If you want to use the scale and research, you want to take the scale. If you've got practices, guided meditations, written exercises. I've tried to design it as a one-stop shopping, so to speak, so if anyone's interested, they can find that resource. You did a great job with us. Thank you very much.

Thank you. That's my kind and friendly voice at least I'm directing it to you. Yes. I'll learn how to do it to myself at some point. Yes. Thank you. You're welcome. You're welcome.

Big thanks to Kristen. I want to remind you, in just a few days, right here in this podcast feed, we're going to post a bonus meditation from Kristen called Self-Compassion Break. Let's get to voicemails now. Here's number one. Hi, I'd like to know if some people are just not cut out for meditation i've taken a mindfulness course and i spent six months meditating

virtually every day at least fifteen minutes often longer and in a few of my meditation practices early on i had some satisfaction and I was glad I did it. But for the last three months, it felt more like a burden to meditate every day. I never really felt any tangible benefits.

And when I stopped meditating, which I did about three months ago, I felt a great sense of relief that it's one less thing that I have to do in the day. So I just wonder whether I'm just not cut out from meditation. Thank you. I love this question. I'm really glad you asked it. And I totally get it, especially, you know, when you, anytime I take something off my to-do list, it feels good. So I get it. I don't know you and I don't know your mind, so I'm just going to take a guess,

give you one thing to explore that might get you back on the wagon here, which is I think from my read on the science of habit formation and behavior change, a massive, massive factor is sort of the pleasure center or the pleasure centers of your brain. In other words, we don't really do things unless we're getting something out of it. You said you didn't feel like you were getting something out of it. So I want to orient you toward a moment that can happen after just a little bit of meditation, you know, a few weeks of a little bit of meditation daily-ish.

There's a moment that can happen that if you're looking out for it, can really hammer home the benefits and lock in the habit, which is that you're going about your daily life, and all of a sudden something happens and you're overcome ambushed by a powerful emotion, in my case, it's usually anger.

And sometimes, after a little bit of meditation, with the power of mindfulness, self-awareness on board, that moment might go a little differently than it's gone for us the rest of our lives. In other words, instead of being blindly carried away by your anger and eating a bunch of stuff you didn't want to eat or saying something that you regret or sending an email that damages relationships, maybe even with your boss, maybe in that moment you notice the anger coming up and you watch it arise and pass. And instead of reacting blindly, you respond wisely. I've talked a million times on the show about respond not react because of all the meditation

cliches, it is my favorite. And I think it is, in my experience, it's the one that really kicked in the quickest and was the insight and game changer that was the earliest and most prominent for me. And I've noticed in my little side hustle as a meditation evangelist over the last decade well actually it's really only been five years where I've been public about it the five years before that I was libering on my book. Anyway I've noticed in the five years that I've been out and about talking about this that when people come to me and talk about the first time that happens for them, that's when I see their eyes really

light up. So it's not so much about what's the experience you're having on the cushion day today because it's very easy for that to feel frustrating or stupid or stressful to get it in. It's really, you know, a Sharon Salzburg, the great meditation teacher has said, we don't meditate to get better at meditation. We get, we meditate to get better at life. So, my gingerly offered suggestion to you is maybe try to go back to a little bit of meditation

for a couple of weeks with the agenda to investigate off the cushion, are there moments when I'm less reactive because once that becomes clear to you I think the benefits become radiantly clear. So is it possible that some people just aren't cut out for meditation? I guess but I have For lack of a better word faith Meaning I don't really have evidence for this, I just have some core conviction that with the proper instruction and encouragement actually meditation can be incredibly useful for if not everyone the vast majority.

So give that a shot. Hope that helps. Here's voicemail number two. Hi Dan, my name's Amy. I live in Oregon, although I just recently moved here from Alaska. I've been meditating for over 30 years. I'm 60 years old and the reason I bring my age up is because I have a technical degree. That's one of the issues. I grew up prior to Title 9 being implemented and prior to abortion rights. and when I was going to college, getting

my technical degree I got, I went to a job fair where I had a man that worked for a large corporation tell me they didn't hire women because they tended to quit and get pregnant and quit. And so I worked for 25, 30 years in my profession and I kind of got fed up with the male domination of the profession, I think is kind of what happened. But here's what I recently was listening to an episode of your podcast. It was with Dolly Choo and I suddenly realized that I have quit. Not only did I leave my profession and start my own business,

I quit listening to any music that men produce other than say like punch brothers or Chris tile. I quit reading any literature by man other than Sean A. Quarries when I have read but fiction, I tend not to read any male fiction. I don't watch a lot of movies that are man-based. I think the only podcast I listen to that is a man. And I could go on.

I, you know, like friends on Facebook, I have very few male friends on Facebook, you know, and so on. So anyway, when I listen to the Dolly II episode, I realized what I'm doing is practicing a version. And I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about your experience with a version or how you see a versus behavior in society, because I realized also that I think

that's a lot of the issues going on in society right now. There's a lot of aversion to people with different ideas and frankly that's I think part of what I'm experiencing. So anyway that's my question. Thank you. Bye. Yeah I wanted to take this question but I want to be careful about it because I, you know, I'm the child of a woman who navigated a male-dominated academic Medicine field and I'm also married to a woman who is currently doing the same thing and so I I recognize that Man-splaining is probably not super helpful in this context Ed if I go on about how not all men are Sexist and blah blah blah that's probably going to be helpful since you already know that.

So, and yet, I think there's something super important in your question. And in some ways, embedded in the question is the answer, at least a part of it. The fact that you're noticing that there's a version at play here is, I think, the key insight. And once, you know, I think the, the, the, one of the propositions of mindfulness is that the antidote to a lot of our suffering is simply seeing it clearly. And this seems like it could potentially be a rich field of practice for you. Now that it's on your radar, to notice when a version is arising in the face of mailness. And by the way, just to state the blazingly obvious, you come across this aversion honestly, and that your experience sounds incredibly painful. And it sounds like you're creating pain for yourself still in ways that you're interested

in addressing. And so I guess I would sort of carefully suggest that maybe this is just an area where you could bring your meditation practice to bear and play with it and see what kind of reactions are coming up for you when you're around men or listening to men through media and try to figure out, oh, am I avoiding this reflexively and blindly? Or maybe is there am I missing out on something because I'm just sort of habitually avoiding this stuff and maybe I can get over it or maybe not. I don't know. I just think it might be an interesting thing to play with. You asked also about how I experienced a version in the world and I

experienced a ton of it. Self-directed, a lot of the stuff we're talking about with Kristen this week, I would say a lot of my aversion is self-directed, but you know, then there are just moments where, you know, I see it come up in my close relationships. I think anybody who's married, there are moments where your spouse, you know, just gets on your nerves. And this is where, for me, meditation has just been really useful, just to notice, oh, she's doing it. Bianca is doing something right now that's just driving me crazy, even though there's a real reason why it should be driving me crazy. She's just living her life. And yet, I'm something's triggering, it's triggering something in me. And that's,

I mean, this is a, like an incredibly marriage-enhancing practice. Just to catch it before I say or do something stupid, just lowers the amount of conflict in the relationship because in those moments when I snap at her for, who knows, whatever she's doing something small and for some reason I haven't gotten enough sleep and I'm being irritable and I snap at her, Then I'm just doubly annoyed. I'm annoyed at her for the original quote unquote sin or those almost always something harmless. And then I'm really mad at myself

and then she's also mad at me and it's just a mess. So I've just found that being having this inner telescope that allows me to see, oh yeah, there's a storm brewing here. It's showing usually shows up in my body, somewhere my chest starts to rumble or my stomach is bubbling or gurgling or my ears are turning red, my jaws clenching. Oh yeah, these are, my body settings

and me some signals here that I'm getting annoyed. Well, there are any number of things I can do there, much more constructive, like go to the other room for a second or think about something different or change the subject. Who knows? So, yeah, that's a word salad for you, but hopefully it's useful. And I think it's a insightful of you to come to this point

where you got to ask this question. So, thank you for that. While I'm saying thank you I just want to thank everybody who helps put this show together and there are a lot of them. Ryan Kessler, Samuel Johns, Grace Livingston, Lauren Hartzog, Tiffany O'Mahundro, big thanks to all of you, really appreciate that. And just to everybody who listens, we really appreciate the listening you're listening. and if you like this episode or any other episode sharing it either with a friend or a bunch of people via social media that helps us grow our audience and we love that. You have to look out for Kristen Neff's bonus meditation in your feed in a

couple days and then we'll be back with a brand new episode next Wednesday. See ya! Hey, hey Prime members! You can listen to 10% happier early and add free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today, or you can listen early and add free with 1-3-plus in Apple Podcasts. Before you go, do us a solid and tell us all about yourself by completing a short survey at Wondery.com slash Survey.