Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris - 45: Colin O'Brady, Pro-Endurance Athlete

Episode Date: November 9, 2016

Fewer than 50 people have accomplished the Explorer's Grand Slam, a challenge of summiting the highest peaks on each of the seven continents and completing treks to the North and South poles. Colin O'Brady not only completed the EGS this summer, he shattered the world record for it, finishing in just 139 days. O'Brady also set the world record for climbing the seven summits -- summiting Kilimanjaro in just 11.5 hours. Five years ago, a friend suggested he try mediation and recommended a 10-day silent vipassana retreat. At first O'Brady said he looked at meditation like an elite athlete, hoping to train his body and mind for peak performance, but soon discovered meditation gave him a much greater benefit for his daily life. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

It kind of blows my mind to consider the fact that we're up to nearly 600 episodes of this podcast, the 10% happier podcast. That's a lot of conversations. I like to think of it as a great compendium of, and I know this is a bit of a grandiose term, but wisdom. The only downside of having this vast library of audio is that it can be hard to know where to start. So we're launching a new feature here, playlists, just like you put together a playlist of your favorite songs.

Back in the day, we used to call those mix tapes. Just like you do that with music, you can do it with podcasts. So if you're looking for episodes about anxiety, we've got a playlist of all of our anxiety episodes. Or if you're looking for how to sleep better, we've got a playlist of all of our anxiety episodes, or if you're looking for how to sleep better, we've got a playlist for that. We've even put together a playlist of some of my personal favorite episodes. That was a hard list to make. Check out our playlists at 10%.com slash playlist. That's 10% all one word spelled out..com slash playlist singular.

Let us know what you think. We're always open to tweaking how we do things and maybe there's a playlist we haven't thought of. Hit me up on Twitter or submit a comment through the website. Hey, everybody, it's Dan. I'm recording this the day before the election, but we're posting it the day after the election. So as I speak, I have no idea how the election is gonna go,

but I assume it's gonna be stressful. So this podcast is like an antidote to whatever stress you may be feeling about the election. This guy, Colin O'Brady, is just awesome. And total, I, this isn't overused word, but in his case, absolutely apt, inspiring. He is a professional endurance athlete. Check out what he did over the summer. He shattered the world record for the what's called the Explorer's Grand Slam Which means he had to summit the highest peaks on each of the seven continents and then trek to the north and south poles, which is like Totally insane. He did it in 139 days and as you know the punchline here a huge part of what keeps him on task is meditation and he's got a really interesting practice a fascinating backstory I give you Colin

O'Braidy. From ABC this is the 10% happier podcast I'm Dan Harris. Thanks for doing this. My pleasure. Thanks for having me here. You're kind of crazy which we'll get into in a minute. But before we get into the insane stuff you've been doing lately, let's just start with meditation.

How did you get into meditation to start with? So I was racing troughflon professionally just about five years ago on a day, 2020-11, and a friend of mine, she came and saw a troughbone race that I was doing, and she's not an athlete at all. Actually, Turkish girl, just kind of non-into sports, and she was like, oh, you know, it seems like this is a very mental challenge out there. You know, here we are, like running super hot day,

suffering, and she was like, I think you'd really benefit from meditation. And I was like, okay, like, so I was born on the hippie commune. Bob Marley was playing when I was born, 30 people watching my birth type of thing. I mean, true hippie commune. So I would say, I was around that sort of spiritualism, if you will, but never had meditated a single minute in my life. And so my friend, Etchay, she said, you should do some meditation.

I was like, yeah, well, what do you recommend? She was like, you should do a 10-day silent, the pasta meditation retreat. So let's just define what that is. Yeah. So I think the pasta actually describes a whole range of meditation techniques, but generally when people use it in this context, they're referring to goenca retreats. Exactly. So that's a specific style of retreat, 10 days silent, and they start you focusing on the breath, and then they move you to focusing on body sensation.

Exactly. Exactly. So I decided it was another six months or so till I had an off season with Traphon. Normally I only get a couple of weeks off in the year, and all my fellow competitors were like, you train all year long, you race all year wrong, and the two weeks you get off,

you're gonna go sit silently, like by yourself, not look at anyone, not talk to anyone, yeah, so it's gonna be great, you know, I'm really looking forward to it. And so, what was it like? It will describe to me that the whole, I've been on silent 10 day retreats before, but never with Galenka, who is a teacher,

who's an Indian guy is no longer with us, who trained in Burma. What are the rules on this retreat? Yeah, so just to set the scene, my stepdad is dropping me off and he says, okay, Colin, I'm just going to stay here in the parking lot for an hour because I've never heard you shut up and you're entirely on the youngest of seven. I'm always bugging my older sisters. He's like, so once you realize this is a terrible idea, I'll be here to drive you home. So he was wrong.

But it was great. The rules are pretty strict, sort of 4 AM to 9 PM schedule most. 4 AM? Yeah, 4 4 30 I can't remember, but it's very early. I've done two of these now, but I can't remember the exact time. But anyways, it gets you up early and it's pretty much meditation throughout the entire day.

No reading, no writing, no eye contact. No talking. Obviously no talking. And so yeah, I mean, it's a very, very silent. Men and women are separated. And so you pretty much feel like you're in more or less, in isolation. Can you talk, is there a teacher there that you can talk to if you have a question?

Yeah, so Goynka, which is interesting, as you mentioned, he originated from Burma and started facilitating some of these 10-day retreats in the West. Best I know it. And I thought this was bizarre. I had no idea before I went to this, but he's on, he's a video recorded, yeah, because he's dead. He passed away, I think, two years ago, but this, but he's on his video recorded. Yeah, because he's dead. He passed away I think two years ago, but this was he was actually alive at the time, but they like throw in the DVD and hit play. And I was like, wait a second, I'm at a meditation retreat. The guy is like not even here.

And I actually thought that was very strange at first, but I've actually come to realize that I really appreciate it because it's uniform. It's the same every single time. It's not, you know, someone's own interpretation on the teaching here and there and it kind of gets lost and meandering. So actually, I appreciate that it's just, you know, when you're going this, it's like, it's the same. But there is also a teacher there on site so that if you do the one thing you can do to sort of break the silence, I suppose, is there's a 30 minute period within the day that you can sign up to ask a question.

Just, you know, I'm feeling this with the meditation, or I have this question about the practice, but the rest of that is sort of him walking through some of the steps, on recording, and they're pretty basic, right? He's only talking for maybe three, four minutes, and then it's, you know, an hour of silence, you know, meditating in the hall,

and then maybe another, you know, minute or two of chanting. So it's an hour of silence of meditating in the hall, and then maybe another minute or two of chanting. So it's a lot of quiet time. And so how did it go for you that first time? It was ups and downs. I think you probably know this as well. You have the main potential of those first meditation retreat, you fork moments, and I experienced that a little bit for sure. More than anything, I felt after those 10 days coming back,

Jenna, my fiance, and other people in my life really, actually they noticed a difference in me, just a calmness, I think, yeah, just a general level of awareness that I didn't have before. So it was interesting to have other people perceive that. But it was an incredible experience, truly changed my perspective. It was interesting because I had gone into this,

like I said, oh, I want to be better at my craft. I want to be better athlete at the professional level. So I got to master my mind, kind of have had this sort of athlete perspective on it and sure that that did have some benefits there, but really it was much greater benefit and it's the rest of the aspects of my life. Would you talk about that? What do you mean greater benefits?

So I mean, like I said, I think I was like, oh, you know, I want to be able to push my limits and have this pain tolerance when I'm racing and you know, if I can master my male, that's kind of like what I went into it you know like training the mind training the body and You know more so I think I just felt the difference in my relationships with you know silly stuff like you know Get cut off in traffic not reacting to it, you know, I had a silly. Yeah, that's your actual life, man Right like that's the day you know just day to day stuff not just And so in the end that was just much more powerful to me

It was just my sort of daily reactions and what that what that meant to me you said on that first recruit you had a few Euphoric moments what were those like I think the thing that stood out the most for me was The memories so I kind of got into this place where I memories. So I kind of got into this place where I was reliving memories from my past, but in such vivid detail. I know I'm trying to be clearing my mind, but there was some moments where I would instead of, it made me realize that we often have memories that we think back on, but something usually joltz us out of those memories. Like, oh yeah, I was a kid. I, you know, swam in a pool with my friend or something like that. But because of the quietness after five, six, seven days, I would come to a memory and

I'd be there almost like in a, you know, a vivid dream or a waking dream and I could look around, I could smell everything, I could see everything. And so the realization that all those memories were really deeply imprinted in the brain and that there was a way to access them was really powerful for me. I almost felt like I was just like walking through this dream of my past in a really interesting way. Did you get back to that Bob Barley moment when you were born? I didn't quite get back to that moment, although I hear it was a good party.

I'm sure it was. So how did it affect your professional life? You just finished something I mentioned insanity before and so sorry for being judgmental, but this thing you just did is crazy. It's called the Explorers Grand Slam. So, I'm going to let you describe what it is, and then tell me whether meditation was useful in the pursuit of this goal. Yeah, so after racing trough on professionally for a number of years at a site, I want to

sort of raise the bar and go after something even even bigger as one does. Yeah, push my body so I Went to set the world record for the explorers grand slam So what that is is to climb the tallest mountain on each of the seven continents collectively known as the seven summits as Well as complete expeditions to both the north and south pole so no big deal So fewer than 50 people have ever accomplished the Grand Slam usually in five, 10 years, and I have as a legacy project trained for one exhibition coat, you know, home. And I completed it in 139 days. Which is a world record.

World record, new world record, and also set the world record for the seven summits at the same time as well. So two world records in the course of this and basically, yeah, 139 days just straight into that country. Didn't you sum it, kill him in jargon like 12 hours, which usually takes people weeks? 11 and a half, 11 and a half. Okay, so this is wild body stretching, pushing mind, stretching, pushing stuff, you're really pushing the limits

on this stuff. So the meditation helped you in any aspect of this? Absolutely, you know, maybe it's cliche, but this was a bigger mental challenge than it was a physical challenge. I mean, the physical elements are surely there, but, you know, everyone wants to hear about, you know, the epic summit day on Everest,

and sure, like that, that was a big deal as a huge push. But 139 days consecutively without really any breaks, you know, day in and day out in these super harsh environments, you know, the average temperature when I was going to the North and South Pole was minus 40 degrees. To give some perspective on that best way to describe it is, I actually could get out of my tent with a cup of boiling water and Throw that in the air and it would immediately turn into ice So that's how cold minus 40 degrees is so you're dragging out, you know, 150 pounds sled behind you with your gear in it

Sensory deprivation and an article because you've got, you know, basically nothing on the horizon other than white and you're just walking day You know hour after hour after day They're out with three other people. So yeah, each expedition was a little bit different. Some I was alone, some I was with different different friends and whatnot. But it's just that that mental that mental determination to keep going under those circumstances is in pretty intense. I think that the meditation helped me throughout all of that. In the moments, there was frightful moments, being up really high on Everest in a big storm that I eventually had to retreat from in a place

where I can't for on Everest, where a lot of people have died historically to just kind of calm myself down, go with it myself, figure out what the best thing to do. So I think that that calmness was huge. But then yeah, these long days, these long stretches, almost feel like a walking meditation more than anything. It's just gonna ask that, could you use, because your mind can go crazy in those situations.

You can get bored, you can get discouraged, could you use it as a way to just hone in on the sort of micro sensations of, to be little cliche, the present moment and, and use that as almost like a survival tactic. Absolutely. I mean, I actually felt, I've similar to a longer meditation retreat in my experience, you know, the first couple of days you're kind of breaking some habit patterns of your day

to day hustle and bustle. And then once you kind of can calm down, calm the mind down, at least for me, I feel that I can really get into that rhythm and that in a 10 day retreat, you know, almost day one to day three is a longer segment than day three to day 10. Yeah, because you're in rebellion mentally. Yeah.

And so I felt similar, you know, going to the polls was the same thing. You know, the first day or two, you're kind of finding your rhythm, finding your routine. And once you kind of settle into it, I felt like, you know, it just kind of flow day after day, because not only was the walking very repetitive, and there was no sensory input, you're just looking at this white abyss essentially. But every day is the same. So in Antarctica, the sun is up 24 hours a day.

The sun's directly overhead, it's high noon, just the whole time. So there's really no variance in what's happening. So what ends up happening is you have this cycle to the day of just this sort of repetition. I get up, I turn the stove on, I pack my sleeping bag, I pack my tent, I go to my set, I walk for 10 hours, it's minus 40, then I get in,

I defaw my gloves out. It just, it sounds minus 40, then I get in, I, you know, deep thaw my gloves out, you know, just, it's a, almost, it sounds boring, but also really powerful to get into this sort of repetitive cycle with that. And certainly, if you didn't, I think for myself, if I didn't have that, you know, background and meditation, background and mindfulness and awareness, that that could also drive you crazy, because it's just, you know, complete defibrase and no one to talk

to, no one to nothing to see. But with not resisting that urge out there I'm really kind of getting into that mentality. I thought was some of the most interesting things of this whole entire project was getting into that almost flow state. Even though it's not sitting on a mat with my eyes closed but a sort of walking meditation, if you will. I know. Yeah, no better word for it, I guess. I think it's great.

I think you picked the exact right words. And it does hammer home a point that I'm still learning all the time, which is that meditation shouldn't really be about the precious sacred moments when you're on the cushion. It's training for the rest of your life. And so you're actually really just putting it into action, which is amazing in ways that most of us will

never ever get to do. What about pain tolerance, though? You know, one of the biggest things that happened in my life before I was introduced to meditation in 2008, I was severely burned in a fire. I was in Thailand, being a knucklehead kid, jumping a flaming jump rope, caught myself on fire. Flaming jump rope, which is a thing they do on the beach there like in the middle of the night usually people are a little hammered Yeah, believe it or not. I wasn't that that was probably the one night I wasn't on that trip, but I wasn't believe it or not, but yes So anyways that you know long story short, you know severely burned 25% of my body mostly legs and feet Doctor told me hey, you may never walk again normally, you know

There's a cat running around my bed in the ICU for a week of surgeries. It's a really pretty horrible set of circumstance. You mean it wasn't at a hygienic hospital? I was in a tie. Yeah, and Bangkok, great, great healthcare facilities, but it wasn't eight days until I could get there. So I was in a very rural part of Thailand

that just had the bare bone basis. So this wasn't a comfort cat. This was a stray cat in the ICU kind of like and you know with burns infection is kind of the highest problem So anyways that Certainly not something I would ever want to go through wouldn't wish on my worst enemy You know took me over a year to even you you know, really walk again, run again, all those types of things. Fortunately, I did recover and have been able to do, you know, professional sport, but

it also recalibrated my pain tolerance. It, you know, I don't know what it is about the mind, but we operate in these extremes, I think, sometimes. So when I was out there, you know, climbing Mount Everest, when I was out there, pulling the sled through minus 40 degrees, other racing trough on after that, it was always this, wow, this hurts, my body wants us to stop. But you know what, I felt worse. I've had worse things experienced. So there's always this higher pain threshold. And I think that a combination of that framework with the burn accident and now in combination with the meditation practice over the last five years has allowed me to have really a lot of power over my mind

in terms of being able to push a little bit further. Our mind, I think, in terms of pain, at least for my experience, wants to shut us down a lot sooner than we really need to be. You're out of breath, I should stop running. But really, we have a capacity to push well beyond that, and override that with our mind, I think, is really important. How do you know when you're pushing so far that you're going to get hurt?

Yeah, definitely knowing your limits. Through racing, through training, I've made that mistake. I've, you know, through racing, through training, I've made that mistake. I've over-trained myself in 2012. I had to take about six months off from racing trough-long because I ended up in the hospital with them telling me my testosterone levels were that of a 92-year-old man. I mean, I had just kind of crushed my body,

no acute injuries, but just like my entire bodies and dorphins and whatnot had just shut down on me from pushing beyond that. But also a valuable lesson in terms of calibration, in terms of figuring out my limits and having the emotional and physical cues to do that. And even that failure, I think led to ultimately my success in this world record to be able to manage that over 139 days in these extreme conditions,

was the ability to sort of regulate, you know, pushing when I needed to, recovering when I needed to, and finding that balance. It's interesting that I never thought about pain tolerance as like a trainable thing before. To me, the headline of meditation is that the mind is trainable. You know, we know the body's trainable, but the meditation, which for so long

has been written off as this kind of fringy thing. Now the science is showing us that the mind is trainable. These traits that we don't, may not like about ourselves, impatience, lack of compassion, emotional reactivity, we can train these things and that's amazing. I never really, I never really thought about pain tolerance.

I mean, I've watched, I have a terrible pain tolerance. I mean, I've watched my wife go through childbirth and then surgeries for breast cancer and reconstruction and all this stuff, and she handles it just incredibly well. And I can't even get a flu shot, you know. So, but this is an interesting, I'm not that I'm in the market for more pain, but the it is an interesting thing to think about that you could train this too. Well, it's I think childbirth is a great example, which is, you know, I have never experienced that. But it's something that certainly is this incredible physical thing that clearly the human body, at least the female human body, is capable of going going through and surviving

and thriving afterwards. And I think the only thing I could equate that to, for me, is the burn, not something that I would have ever wanted to go through, but that was sort of cast upon me. But to get through to the other side of that, you realize, oh, this is possible. So we have these barriers. And I think women through childbirth,

I mean, stronger than I could possibly ever imagine. I mean, it's unimaginable for me to go through something like that, but it just goes to show. Our minds are very capable of handling that. Our bodies are very capable of handling that. And it's a weird thing. Like you said, can you train for it? I don't know.

I don't think I'd want to just go under pain just so I could train for that. But your training is painful. Yeah, absolutely it is it is no doubt Which leads me to let's leads me to my question. Why are you doing this? Why I mean I get I guess I guess I get that you Why somebody want to be a triathlete? But then taking it to the next level Let me just take that back. I don't get why anybody would want to be a triathlete really. What is driving you to do this?

And then why then try to set this Explorer's Grand Slam World record? I've always been an athlete. I swam through college. I love sports, and I love pushing my body. So all of these, I think, have been some iteration of the five-year-old boy inside of me that always wanted to compete and do well

in sports. But also, I think as I've gotten older, racing trough on was wonderful, but it was also really competitive on the race course, shoulder to shoulder with the next guy, what's your world ranking? How did you win this race? You've lived this race. And I've had my fair share of successes.

I've had my fair share of failures on the professional world stage. But what I finally found was that I was more interested, at least as I got older, I'm 31 years old now, in finding my own personal limits, pushing my own personal limits. So although this mountaineering project I was out there going after a world record, technically I was racing another guy. But the guy's record who I was racing was from four or five years previously. It wasn't as if I

was like shoulder to shoulder with the guy who I was trying to break his record, but it was about finding my own personal, you know, levels, pushing my own personal limits. And I think just like with a meditation practice, it's the same thing, you know, you don't just go, I've got it now, you know, I've, oh, all right, I've meditated. I understand meditation. Even for you, like you said, it's just always a constant evolution of that. And I find with pushing my body at least for me

is a way to access amazing parts of my mind. There's a clip of me that I like to show sometimes when I'm public speaking. And it's me summiting Aakong Kha'Gro, which is the tallest mountain in South America. It was the third mountain on this entire project and at the time the tallest mountain I'd ever climbed. And I ended up climbing that mountain completely alone for various reasons. My climbing partner couldn't be there with me and I'm on top of this mountain just crying, sobbing.

I've got a, I'm talking to my own GoPro, so I'm talking to myself to record this because I was trying to record and share most of this project with the world. But it's this very vulnerable moment of euphoria, tears, all the people that's helped and supported me. I flash back in my mind to the burn accident and sort of all the setbacks that I've gone through.

And so for me anyways, pushing my body to this extreme ways can unlock these moments like that that I find to be incredibly special, incredibly valuable. And you know, sure it goes through a lot of pain, a lot of toil and a lot of hardship and hanging out in minus 40 degrees day and in day out. Like I'll be honest, isn't particularly fun most of the time. But there's something about it that it really unlocks inside of me that is powerful and meaningful. Hey there listeners, while we take a little break here, I want to tell you about another

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You can listen early and add free on the Amazon or Wondery app. So let me ask you a tough question. You know, so Gowenka is, he was trained in a Buddhist context, but he actually teaches in a secular context. So, I don't know how much traditional Buddhism he infuses into his teachings, but in Buddhism there's a big focus on impermanence. Everything changes, nothing lasts. So the body that you are rightfully, very proud of right right now is going to fall apart.

Absolutely. Nobody gets out of here alive. Yep. And somebody's going to beat your world record someday. Absolutely. How are you going to handle those eventualities? And what are you going to do for, you know, when you don't have access to this finely honed, well-trained body in the way that you do now

What are you gonna do for the kind of meaning that you're now driving? You know, I think that that will potentially be a challenge for me I'm not not to say I'm sitting here and I'm above and beyond that But what I will say is that It's been amazing to have the opportunity to set this world record this year these two world records And that's not a culmination of one or two years of work That's a culmination of my entire life that started when I was a five-year-old kid jumping and assuming pool and culminated with me You know summoning Denali a few months ago setting two world records all of those things all of those

athleticism and ups and downs have have fueled that and it's amazing and I understand obviously I'm aware as you've said that that's amazing. And I understand, obviously, I'm aware, as you've said, that that's time limited, that I'm, you know, I'm kind of in the peak endurance age, you know, if you look at elite marathoners, elite traffic, you know, climbers, whatnot, that there's some of this peak age, late 20s or early 30s, you know, maybe you can stretch it out a few more years, I'm still feeling great. There might be a couple, you know, a couple more, you know, things in the tank, but ultimately, I'm, you know, kind of on the downside of that parabola pretty soon, right? But what I've realized, at least that I hope, is that my measuring stick isn't always the

world record or being the best guy. Records are made to be broken. I love sport. And what's great about sport is we're constantly breaking barriers, the four minute mile, the 10-second, 100-meter dash. All all of these things thought once impossible, people have shattered them. And so, my record will go down at some point as well, I'm sure. But my hope is that I will obviously be able to find my best self. So, my best 40-year-old or 50-year-old or 60-year-old self might not be, you know, up to par against my 31 year old self right now.

But that's okay with me, as long as I'm finding the depth of who I am. And I don't mean that just through sport, but I mean that through the evolution of life, there we probably, at least I hope, some more wisdom, mindfulness, awareness that comes out of, you know, aging through and having my body change. And I think that that mantra people have asked me, people outside of the meditation context have asked me, how did you get through these hard moments and these calming these mountains? How did you do this? And honestly, that mantra, this too will change, is really powerful. That's a big part of what I've driven, you know, drawn strength on, is that impermanence? That you're out there in this horrible situation, you're on a snowstorm and wherever, and it's freezing cold and you're scared and you're

away from home and you're thinking, God, it's just be nice to be back in my bed at home and you're thinking at some point I will be, like this too will change. I won't be out here forever. Well, that's the upside of impermanence. No question about it. I mean, and it's useful for me when I'm meditating and I'm uncomfortable or I'm in a conversation that's uncomfortable, not with you, but you know, interpersonal relationships, this too, shall pass is very comforting. But I remember being 31.

I'm 45 now. My shoulders jacked up, my knees jacked up. I have more stuff going on around my belly than I would prefer. There's less stuff going on around my hairl belly than I would prefer. There's less stuff going on around my hair line than I would prefer. And so I can't control any of this in it sucks. And so I just wonder, I mean, it's a very powerful thing to look at this stuff though.

Yeah, it's a very powerful thing because it is the truth, not capital T, dogmatic, religious truth. It is just true. So I feel that I don't know if I can put it into words, but I feel like there's a real power of instaring at that. I don't know if anything that I've just said resonates with you at all. No, I think that resonates with me as well.

I mean, I think that, you know, I'm not above having my ups and downs, right? I think that at some point when I transition away and or my body isn't quite what it is, there's going to be some hard moments. Sure, like I, I don don't wanna say I take for granted being in great shape or having set these world records, I know how much work has gone into it, but yeah, that's the framework. That's the context that my life has looked like

for decades of being in a lead athlete. And at some point that won't be the case and that transition will certainly be hard, no doubt. But I hope that, I've seen that play out with other athletes that haven't had no awareness or haven't had a mindfulness about them or haven't really thought through those things and that when that escapes them,

they have no way of framework for dealing with that. Again, I don't think that I'm above and beyond having my dark moments and I'm sure those will come, but my hope would be that because of, you know, I think meditation, awareness, mindfulness, all those things allows me to go through the phases of life, allows me to react to things. It's a little bit softer, a little bit more gentle.

And like you said, having stared that in the face, having actually, you know, have you asked me that question and think about that? That's not the first time I've thought about it, you know, to internalize that and understand about that impermanence as we go through life and not be holding on to God that year when I was 31 in 2016 I set the record. That was the pinnacle for me. You know, I sure hope that's not the pinnacle of my life. I felt that there be many other

exciting moments and ups and downs and different creative ways to express myself. I'm optimistic on your behalf just for the record. I like it. So, so you done two of these 10-day retreats. Do you have a daily meditation practice or are you just kind of like extreme about meditation you're only doing it on retreat? No, no, I mean, I definitely get a lot from the retreats. I think that that is valuable.

And I just signed up for it, it will be my third in December. So I'm looking for it. It's been a few years since I've done that. So I always find for me that's like a few years since I've done that. So I was fine for me. That's like a good, strong reset button. But none of that is particularly meaningful. I don't think without a daily practice, at least for myself, that said at the end of a Gwanker retreat,

he says, okay, it's very easy. You've been doing this 17 hours a day of meditation. So all you need to do in your daily life is one hour in the morning, one hour at night, no big deal. And I'll be honest, you know, I've left some of those retreats like very like, yeah, that's easy, whatever, and I maybe hold on to it for a week or two weeks, and then all of a sudden two out, finding two hours in my day seems nearly impossible. Maybe that's just an excuse, I don't know.

But my daily practice is shorter than that, you know, quite honestly. It's more in the, you know, 15 to 20, 30 minute range. That's not nothing, man. Yeah, and it, I find the morning works best for me in terms of that's the most in control of my day, but that also ebbs and flows, you know, I travel a lot a month, different time zones, I'm on early fights, you know, things like that very frequently.

And so sometimes I'll find, oh, this month, the evening was working better for me. Or so sometimes I'll find, oh, this month, the evening was working better for me. Or there's times when a few days or even a few weeks, I'll go by and I haven't really checked in with that daily practice. So I think I'm definitely would consider myself pretty committed and have a pretty regular practice,

but then I have my moments where I miss it, but then I notice, I pick up on that. I'm like, wait, what's, oh yeah, right. Like I'm missing that piece of this. Yeah, why am I crack why am I Snapping at people today, right? It's better. It's so yeah daily practice is huge but mine's pretty simple Yeah, everybody falls off the wagon The thing just as when you're on the cushion and you're actually meditating the rule is you're gonna get distracted a million times The whole game is just to start again. Yeah, it's the same thing with your meditation practice writ large.

You're gonna fall off the wagon. Totally cool, nothing's been lost. You can just start again and you're not like starting from some sort of crazy deficit. Having said all that, just walk me through just out of curiosity. What, when you sit down for your daily practice when you're doing it, what is the practice for you? Yeah, I actually, I actually read your book a few years ago before knowing that I would be invited on your podcast, so it's fun to be here. And the person who gave me the book actually was

my stepdad, the same one who was very skeptical about me going to the first meditation. The dude in the parking lot. Yeah, like, yo, you know, this is not going to work out for you. I'll pick you up. And then it was the first, you know, that got through to him. Being a skeptic just kind of like, okay, 10% happier. That's cool. But what I liked about that was just that, at least it seems like you dove into a lot of different types of meditation from, you know, the vastness, the different retreats, to just

kind of seeing it through a bunch of different angles. And perfectly honest, for me, I've really only experienced, you know, this bopostinum meditation only because that was the first kind of thing thrown at me, like, hey, you should try this out. I did it and it had some impact in my life. And so my, you know, daily practice is along those lines. It's kind of a, you know, like you said, kind of coming to breath. And sometimes it's just coming to breath, you know, like you said, kind of coming to breath. And sometimes it's just coming to breath.

You know, in 10, 15 minutes, I, you know, can't get more focused than just that. And then on other times when I'm in that field like more of a rhythm, I can kind of do that body scan and, you know, awareness of the sensations of the body up and down. But I would say I have a curiosity about sort of expanding that, expanding sort of what, you know, maybe, I don't know, I don't even know what that is, but the sort of other sort of avenues of meditation beyond sort of what my daily, you know, norm is, I guess, at this point. Do you think that that's valuable or what, from your perspective? Well, I just want to say, first of all, I'm not a teacher and I'm not an expert.

I've only been doing this for about seven years. So like, you should take what I say with a grain of salt, but so I'm giving you anyway. I think what you're doing sounds great. and I wouldn't worry about changing it. That's personally my advice. I think this is a great practice going because a massively respected and deservedly respected teacher. He's taught you a really simple practice that you don't have to stress about or worry about. You've got it. So go for it, and it's showing benefits. I do the same practice that I was taught many years ago,

and I have experimented a little bit, but I find my gut instinct, and I'm speaking for myself here, is that if I experiment too much, I can create a lot of doubt in my mind, okay, what am I doing now? Is this better than the last thing? And the people I know who've done the most successful experimentation have a firm grounding in one technique for a long time. And then once they've got that base, it's a little bit like art, you know, like modern art, which looks kind of crazy

and there are no rules. A lot of those modern artists have classical training. And so, I'm not sure that's a perfect analogy, but that seems to be the MO of a lot of meditation adeps that I've met. Yeah, no, that's interesting. And it's almost just the, you know, whether for some it's yoga, whether for others, it's, you know, they're morning run, whether it's, you know, sitting on the cushion and meditating, I guess just having that sort of daily commitment to something is an outlet in itself, regardless of what the actual, you know,

what you're thinking about, what the true focus is of that, you know, even of slight variation. So yeah, I'll stick with it. Thanks for the advice. Please do, and it's my pleasure. And again, take that advice with a grain of salt because I'm just a regular schmo. So I want to make an observation that I want to ask you another question. The observation is, and I was glad pleasure. And again, take that advice with a grain of salt because I'm just a regular schmo. So I want to make an observation

that I want to ask you another question. The observation is, and I was glad you said this earlier, because I think it's cool, is that when you were having moments of real emotional peak experiences during your exploits, one of the things that came to you was this gratitude for all these people who have helped you. And I just want to point out you're here today

with your fiance, Jenna, who I had a chance to meet very, very briefly but she, this grand slam that you just completed required an enormous amount of logistical work, you know, getting teams together for the various hikes and getting you on planes and making sure you, the trains are running on time, etc., etc. And from what I understand she was really haunchowing that so absolutely this is this is not a one-man show by any means You know, we dreamed up this world record together. She had been you know out with me on the trough on world for many years supporting me doing that And then when we kind of had this dream of doing this So much of what we wanted to do with this project wasn't just about me setting this world record, but it was a whole

charitable campaign around getting kids excited and inspired to get outside, not necessarily climb Mount Everest, but to get outside, be outside and inspired, set big goals and dream big. So, you know, Geno ran everything from the logistics of all this to get to all those places, took over a year plus of just the planning of, how do you figure out how to get the food in Africa a week after you've been in Argentina to fly to Nepal? Just the crazy logistics. And she was amazing in that. And just so much support.

Yeah, definitely, there's times very scared in some of these climbs where I had to call home. What should I do? I'm up on average, there's times very scared in some of these crimes where I had to call home, what should I do? I'm up on that verse, there's a storm, and to have that voice on the end of a crackly satellite phone, just sending me love and support was also huge. So she wore the hat of Taskmaster and Logistics Coordinator as well as just my fiance and my love of my life and support system.

So definitely so much gratitude for that. And in these peak moments, for sure, that definitely came out. One of the other things that really stood out for me in terms of along the same lines was, my hope was what this project was to put some inspiration in the world. We had a lot of kids from around the country

following along via social media. And I was like, oh, I hope to inspire them to one day. It's epic, awesome, dream big. But of course, I irony to that was that when I was like, oh, I hope to inspire them to one day, you know, it's epic, all some dream big. But the, of course, I irony to that was that when I was out there, climbing these mountains, they had sent me all these messages that said, hey, Colin, you know, your ever says, your climbing ever is right now. But my Mount Everest is to be the first person my family to graduate from college. My Mount Everest is to make sure the snow leopards are off the endangered species. Just these amazingly heartfelt and warm things.

And the fact that they were out there kind of cheering me on ultimately inspired the heck out of me. When I had these really tough moments, I had so much gratitude. I was hoping to do something for them, but in the end, I got so much strength from the love that they were shining my way. So it was an amazing sort of reciprocity in that way. That's awesome. So shout out to Jenna, who as I understand, is her self, an experienced mountain

here and shout out to kids and shout out to snow leopards. Nobody does anything alone. I just, I'm glad you pointed that out. I think it's very cool. So that was my observation. My question is, what is your next trick? Yeah. No, it's, it's no, it's a good question.

Definitely, I think that I will always be wanting to push my body and explore. You know, that said, you know, touching on what you said before, one, I can't always keep wanting up myself. Like you said, father time, well, at some point, you know, say enough, you know, as I get older. But even while I'm still in peak shape, is, you know, I've asked myself, you know, I enough, you know, as I get older. But even while I'm still in peak shape is, you know, I've asked myself, you know, I've sat with myself even, you know, in my practice and said, is, you know,

is my goal to just keep one uping myself? Is it always the next harder, crazier, you know, thing, you know, and no, I mean, the answer is no. And I wouldn't say no, like, oh, I'm going to kick my feet up and just talk about this experience for the rest of my life. That's also not what I'm trying to get at. But it's trying to figure out a creative way to push myself, to find, to access those moments of joy, to access those moments of facing my fears.

And I don't know what that next thing is in terms of athleticism. There's definitely a few ideas percolating in my mind that I haven't really fixated on yet. But definitely this idea of the whole reason that I started this was to do something greater than myself. Having raised trough on professionally for a number of years after coming off this terrible burn injury was a dream come true.

And that was a very personally satisfying dream come true. But to get to a point where I could have this larger platform and have this impact not only for myself but with the kids was amazing and the lessons I've learned from that is I want to keep you know working in that space. You know that that's usually gratifying for me to have to be helping these kids to be inspiring these kids out there to set goals for themselves. And so whatever I do athletically, we'll see. But there's a 100% certainty in my mind that the continuation with the work that I'm doing with kids and to get kids to, unfortunately in this country, we have an inactivity epidemic.

And so to get kids, just moving their bodies, being healthy, I think, healthy bodies, healthy minds, create so much more happiness and joy and success in this world. And so that I can just do my little part to inspire that is huge. So that's definitely my biggest focus as I move forwards. Um, last question, just out of curiosity. How, how discipline do you about your diet? Like, do you ever allow yourself to mow like a bunch of cookies or, or, you you'll eat cheeseburgers? Yeah, I'm a pretty disciplined guy when it comes to my diet, but that said, you know, having to be in nine different expeditions on seven different continents in 139 days means you're talking about

cuisine from all different types of the world. And we tried to control a lot of things with this project. We also had to let go of a lot of control with this project. When I was Jenna went through the logistics, it was like, hey, we can't just make sure that your perfect diet is dialed in in all of these places. So funny enough, in preparation for this project, I actually kind of dirtyed up my diet a little bit. So my dad's an organic farmer in Hawaii, just to give you context.

I could grow enough, spend a bunch of time in his farm, just eat completely from the earth. Super healthy is healthy can be. So I can get into that mode, and I love the way that my body feels when I'm eating that way. But actually when I'm eating that clean, and then I had to fly to some other part of the world that I can't control my diet,

all of a sudden that could almost throw me around more because of the contrast of so clean to not so clean. So throughout this project, I kind of had to have my body used to be able to eat freeze-dried meals at the North Pole and then fly to, you know, Nepal and eat Dalbat and then fly to the, you know, Argentina and have, you know, the someone throwing a steak my way.

So I am very disciplined, but I'm also, you know, I think everything in moderation, you know, including moderation. So I definitely, you know, have a beer here and there. I definitely enjoy a burger coming off a mountain. So I'm not above those things like that. And those I guess maybe there's a simple choice in life. But sometimes you just got to eat a burger.

I hear you. Best of luck in whatever you do next. Best of luck in marriage, which I know is coming up for you, best of luck in continuing your meditation practice and big thank you for doing this. Thanks for having me on the show, Dan. Where can people learn more about you? Beyond 7.2, so that's the name of this project, the 7-PEEKS-2 poll. So, beyond7.2.com is the website, if you want to see any sort of look back on blogs, videos, photos, everything that we've done, check it out and definitely as our future endeavors will be up there as well as

social media at beyond underscore 72, Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter, all that good stuff. So yeah, check it out beyond 72. Don't take it personally when I crush your world record. I'll come for you. Yeah, I can see it. See like, so if you can do it, you're 45, you know, so you know, maybe there's hope for me as you know, even though you got me down on that fact that I just did deteriorating athlete over here. Sorry to be a bummer. You're a good sport. Thank you very much. Really appreciate it. Thanks for having me.

Okay, there's another edition of the 10% Happier Podcast. If you liked it, please make sure to subscribe, rate us. And if you want to suggest topics we should cover or guess, we should bring or guess we should bring in, hit me up on Twitter at Dan B. Harris. I also want to thank Hardly, the people who produced this podcast and really do pretty much all the work. Lauren, Efron, Josh Cohan, Sarah Amos, Andrew Calb, Steve Jones, and the head of ABC News

Digital Dan Silver. I'll talk to you next Wednesday. Hey, hey, prime members. I'll talk to you next Wednesday. 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 solid and tell us all about yourself by completing a short survey at Wondery.com slash survey.