Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris - 434: Meditation for Control Freaks | Bonus Meditation with Sebene Selassie

Episode Date: April 1, 2022

Get comfortable with uncertainty and cultivate trust in life, even in the most turbulent times.About Sebene Selassie:Growing up, Sebene felt like a big weirdo. Born in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and raised in white neighborhoods in Washington, D.C., she was a tomboy Black girl who loved Monty Python and UB40. She never believed she belonged. Thirty years ago, she began studying Buddhism as an undergraduate at McGill University where she majored in Comparative Religious Studies. Now, Sebene is a teacher, author, and speaker who teaches that meditation can help us remember our inherent sense of belonging, that our individual freedom affects absolutely everyone and everything, and that our collective freedom depends on each and every one of us. To find this meditation in the Ten Percent Happier app, you can search for “Trust Yourself and Breathe,” or click here: https://10percenthappier.app.link/content?meditation=7d6060b0-8c20-4fb0-860b-ed5fd7ef5914.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

What does it even mean to live a good life? Is it about happiness, purpose, love, health, or wealth? What really matters in the pursuit of a life well lived? These are the questions award-winning author, founder, and interviewer Jonathan Fields asks his guests on the Top Ranked Good Life Project podcast. Every week, Jonathan sits down with world renowned thinkers and doers, people like Glenn and Doyle, Adam Grant,

Young Pueblo, Jonathan Height, and hundreds more. Start listening right now. Look for the Good Life project on your favorite podcast app. This is the 10% happier podcast. I'm Dan Harris. Hey gang, it's Friday, bonus meditation time. I think many of us, if not all of us, land somewhere on the control freak spectrum. I certainly do. Even if this notion does not resonate with you personally, it is inarguably true that one of the basic conundrums of the human

situation is that we find ourselves born without asking to be born into an existence where we are definitely not fully in control, not in control of the ceaseless flow of change, of other people's actions, of our own minds, even. So what to do? This is one of the many key functions of meditation to help us get comfortable with uncertainty, to get comfortable with being uncomfortable. Today's meditation comes from the great Seven A. Celacii. Seven A is a core meditation teacher on the 10% happier app. She was born in Ethiopia and raised in Washington, D.C. And she began studying Buddhism three decades ago as an undergrad

at McGill University. She's trained not only as a meditation teacher, but also as an integral coach and an indigenous focusing oriented therapy practitioner. She's also the author of the book, You Belong, a Call for Connection, which I recommend. And I should say she's also a friend and former guests on this podcast. So over to you, Seb.

a friend and former guest on this podcast. So over to you, Seb. Hi, this is Sabine. Wow, things have been bananas out there. Sometimes we want certainty about how things will turn out. But here's the thing, we can't really control life, not just with our current situation, ever. There's uncertainty built right into existence. What we can do is get comfortable with uncertainty and cultivate trust in life, even in the most uncertain times. Let's try practicing that. Begin by settling in and getting comfortable. If you like, close your eyes, or keep them open with a soft focus in front of you. Observing our breath is a great way to both witness change and build trust in the process of life.

Let's begin by connecting to the breath. Take a few deep breaths in and out of the body. In and out. In and out. Pay attention to how the breath feels. And notice if there's any pause between the in-breath and the out-breath. Try it on your own for a bit. You don't need to do anything and the body keeps on breathing. Try bringing a sense of appreciation to the experience of breathing. Take a moment to notice what that appreciation of each breath feels like. Paying attention in this way slows us down out of the rush of trying to make something

in particular happen or figure anything out. But of course, the mind might be tripping you up, demanding that you think about all the things that you're afraid might happen. The mind thinking is not a problem. That's the habit pattern of our minds, our minds think. You can simply notice that and bring your attention back to this intimate awareness of breathing. the inner breath. And the inner breath. And the inner breath. And the inner breath.

And the inner breath. And the inner breath. And the inner breath. And the inner breath. And the inner breath. And the inner breath. And the inner breath. And the inner breath.

And the inner breath. And the inner breath. Whenever it feels like things are uncertain, we can return to the practice of trusting life one breath at a time. You can open your eyes now and begin to move your hands and feet. Thank you for your practice today. May you continue to trust life, breath by breath. Thank you, 7A. We're going to see you back here on Monday for a brand new episode, and it's a bit of a risky one. It's all about sex, which is a subject that 7A, in fact, has been writing about on her

newsletter, which you should go check out. My guest on Monday is Dr. Laurie Brotto, who's a pioneer in the field of research that involves the overlap between mindfulness and sex. She's fascinating, very funny, extremely practical, so that's coming up on Monday. Hey, hey, prime members. You can listen to 10% happier early and ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today, or you can listen early and ad-free with 1-3-plus in Apple podcasts. Before you go, do us a

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