Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris - 53: Josh Radnor, "How I Met Your Mother" Star Back in Theater

Episode Date: December 28, 2016

Josh Radnor, best known for playing Ted Mosby on TV's "How I Met Your Mother," started practicing meditation over a decade ago after he went through a break-up and never really stopped. Radnor's career extends beyond TV -- though he stars in PBS's "Mercy Street" -- to include acclaimed indie film work, Broadway roles, his current role in "The Babylon Line," and he credits meditation for helping him navigate it all. 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.

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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 y'all, it's your girl, Kiki Palmer. I'm an actress, singer, and entrepreneur. I'm a new podcast, baby, this is Kiki Palmer. I'm asking friends, family, and experts,

the questions that are in my head. Like, it's only fans only bad. Where did memes come from? And where's Tom from MySpace? Listen to Baby, this is Kiki Palmer on Amazon Music or wherever you get your podcast. I need to admit something at the beginning of this podcast, which is that I never really watched that show how I met your mother, which was a hit CBS sitcom that ran for many, many years. That's problem, not only for my cultural literacy, but also because my guess this week was one of the stars of that show, Josh Radner.

My producers of this podcast, Lauren Efron, in particular loved how I met your mother and encouraged me to have Josh come on the show. So I did so and I'm glad I listened to them because Josh is fascinating, like totally, totally fascinating, has a legit and long time meditation practice and has used it in some really interesting circumstances in the public guy. He's the star right now of a play.

It's called The Babylon Line and had a really good time talking to him. So here it is. [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ From ABC, this is the 10% happier podcast. I'm Dan Harris. [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ Well, thank you for doing this. Yeah, appreciate it. Yeah. So I always start with the same question, which is how did you start meditating and why? My girlfriend in my 20s, who I did it for years, I thought she had an anxiety problem and she would also agree that she had a problem

with anxiety. And one day I said, you need to meditate. Well, here's what we're gonna do, we're gonna get you meditating. And then she didn't, and we broke up, she's lovely and we're still friends, this is not a, you know, slam against her. Is she still anxious?

I don't think she's as anxious, but I don't even know if she meditates. I don't know. So the major variable, maybe that she's no longer with you. Well, no, maybe I was the cause of the anxiety. That's what I'm saying. But I then was really hit hard by this breakup. And it turned out I was the one who needed to meditate.

You know how we engage in a lot of projection as human beings, and it turned out that I was deeply in need of meditation myself. And I, you know, I think living in the modern world is an assault on your senses in many ways, and it only seems to be getting worse. If that's what it feels like to me anyway. And so I think in 2004, maybe the spring of 2004, I learned Vedic meditation, which is essentially TM. And it's the same practice. But I learned from someone who was very close to the Maharishi, Mahashiyogi. And it was

just, you know, there was a lovely community in LA at that time who was all learning from him and he had trained in a number of teachers. So there was a lovely community in LA at that time who was all learning from him and he had trained a number of teachers So there was a nice community out there and I just started, you know, Twice daily meditation, which I really haven't stopped. I mean, I still Struggle to get the second one in. I don't know what kind of met it. Do you do TM? Is that what I do? Mindfulness. Oh mindfulness. Okay. Yeah. So I Generally most mornings will meditate first thing, You know, I still do it. I sometimes will get the second one in.

I try to get the second one in. But, and my meditation practice has changed. I mean, I've experimented with different forms of it. But since 2004, I've never really stopped meditating. And you know, meditation is one of those subtle things where you say, is it working? And you kind of, it's hard to say, my teacher used to say, drop your consciousness, drop your old consciousness into your new body. And it would go crazy. Like

your body wouldn't be able to hold it. Like the benefits of meditation are so subtle. And they just, they just reveal themselves in a very subtle way. So I think, you know, I look back, my life is very different than it was in 2004. It's a lot bigger. It's, you know, my career took off in different ways. So I have to give a lot of credit to meditation. I don't think it, I don't know that I, maybe the things would have happened,

but I don't know that I would have processed them in a sane way if I wasn't, if I didn't have a meditation practice, you know. Okay, so you said a million things that I want to follow up. Okay, sure. Yeah. If I didn't have a meditation practice, you know, okay, so you said a million things that I want to follow up Okay, sure yeah Just to set myself just in my mind in the chronology of your life here 2004, so that's before how I met your brother. Yeah, I think I did the pilot of how my mother in 2006 Maybe 2005 so at that point where you kind of an aspiring actor had you done?

No, I had been I had started on Broadway in the graduate. I had done a couple pilots in series that, you know, didn't work for a number of reasons. You know, either I was replaced, they were canceled. You know, I did a pilot with Rob Reiner, a friend BC that didn't go, you know, and so I think how I met your mother was my fourth pilot I had done and So I was a working actor. I was probably someone that like casting directors and TV executives would know But the average person on the street would have no idea So was that a kind of an angsty stage in your life? You know it was but in some ways it was there was a sweetness to it because it's something I talked about in my movie Liberal arts that I wrote and directed was this notion that you know when you get out of college or school because it's something I talked about in my movie, Liberal Arts, that I wrote and directed was this notion that, you know, when you get out of college or school

that it's just infinite possibility, like everything's in front of you. And there's a sweetness to that sense of possibility, whereas when something happens like how I met your mother or, you know, that first big job that really introduces you to a lot of people, your whole career on some level has to be a response to that because it's always going to be a part of your, things get narrower, but they also get more exciting in a weird way, like because things are actually happening, but it also, it feels constricting in some ways. So I think my meditation practice through that ended up being really beneficial to me because I had to, you know, I think anyone who achieves some sort of public exposure or renown, there's always a

point where you go a little crazy because you don't know you're being looked at in a different way and you're, you know, you feel like you're being showered and blessing and you're also get a little scared to leave your apartment. You know, all at the same time, it can be very unnerving to taste fame for the first time. Yeah, I mean, very few people ever get to experience that. Yeah, and a lot of people just say they want it without thinking it through. You know what I mean?

Like, I had you thought it through? Not quite. And I don't know that you can. I mean, I certainly wanted a certain amount of visible success. You want as an actor so you can keep doing bigger and better things, you know. I think it would be a really great gig if you could have all the work and none of the fame. I think that would be like the sweet spot. So none of the fame is gratifying, is it not cool? Not exactly none of the fame. I mean, look, it's nice to get a table

and it's nice to have some people come up and just in the middle of your day and tell you how much your work has affected them. That's all very sweet. But there's other things about it that you have to contend with that are, when you don't want it, you know, you can't quite turn it. It's not up to you when you can't turn it on or off.

And I'm not, you know, I don't deal don't deal with, I can still live a life. I've found a way to live a life that feels manageable. And sometimes in LA, they basically leave you alone, because that's very new. And you're in a city. On some level, although there's a lot of students and tourists here. And the students and tourists love the show.

But then you realize you're connecting with people. I mean, I'm a little more attracted to writing and directing now just because it feels less, I mean, it feels like I can still be endlessly creative without all the kind of exposure of my face. Right. But it sounds like you have a managed ego then because a lot of people really care a lot about the exposure of their face. Yeah, but I think that there's a part of me that's actually shy. I don't know if it's ego or what. I still have one and I'm working on it. It's not like I'm immune from the temptations of it.

But I've tried post how I met your mother to make decisions that were not based in some sort of desperation to stay relevant or in front of people. I've gone back to the theater. I've done this show for PBS. Mercy Street. It's called Mercy Street and it's a really good show. But I've kind of thrown myself into ensembles. I haven't been haven't been like, yeah, t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t t that would allow me to be a little more out there. But I must, I try to orient my life in a spiritual context.

And what I mean by that is, did you ever read, by the way, the David Brooks book, The Road to Character? No, I'm familiar with it. It's excellent. I really recommend it. Yeah, really? But he talks about these two things that are competing within us, which he calls resume virtues and eulogy virtues.

And he says, the resume virtues are like, obviously, you know, what makes you high-rebel, what makes you a kind of interesting person at a dinner party. And the eulogy virtues are like, what will they say about you at your funeral? Was he a good friend? Was he a good parent? Was he generous, charitable kind, compassionate forgiving, all those things. And I can get hijacked by resume virtues, certainly, it takes up a lot of space in my head, but I ultimately feel like I wanna be a person who leans into eulogy virtues more. And I try to remember that, you know,

the kind of deathbed moment of like what kind of person, you know, the old, you know, no one wishes they spend more time at the office. And I, and I feel like there's some gift in, in how I met your mother, like, freed me up to actually because it didn't, and I'm really grateful for that show. And I love being a part of it. But it didn't give me the kind of sustained euphoria that you think it would. And what people are disappointed to hear that it didn't, you know, they'll, like, what do you mean you weren't endlessly happy for nine, you're in straight years,

and you're like, well, nothing, you can't get out of being human, you can't get out of the peaks and values of being a human being. So it sent me on this search for, well, what is meaningful? Like, I love doing work, but it's doing the work, you know, I, there were things I did that were really small that have been so meaningful to me. And just a couple of people will see them, but it doesn't matter to me because it, it altered me and changed me. And meditation is something that gets me back to being quiet, so I can hear that kind of guidance like you'll

agree virtue guidance versus the you know like the ego just it's a bully it's just gonna scream at you and and that's one of the ways you can tell that it's the ego is if it's screaming and if there's confusion because I feel like and if it's self-referential and yeah and it's all about yourself if it's not extending itself beyond your own kind of gratification in every any moment, you know. So just trying to get to that place, you know what, it's not even my, I wasn't raised Christian, but when Jesus says, you know, the kingdom of heaven is within, I think that's

what he's referring to, you know, that the answers are actually a friend of mine just told me this great acronym for faith, finding answers in the heart, you know, like going within and getting quiet, like that's where you're actually going to get the true GPS, the one that'll lead you to like a more sustainable, I don't even know if happiness is the right word, but like peace, just some equanimity. So you're not on the crazy, you the crazy roller coaster of the up and down. I feel I'm always trying to find some sort of equanimity

in that regard. So tell me just for the uninitiated, tell me, just describe what Vedic meditation is. I'll start you off a little bit. So, mindfulness meditation, which is what I do is to derive from Buddhism. And I actually probably, even if I'm gonna be more honest, I probably just flat out Buddhist,

because that's mostly what I do. Vedic meditation is Hindu meditation, mostly with a mantra. The most famous variety of that is transcendental meditation, TM, which was invented by the Maharishi Mahashya. It's actually, I don't know that he invented it, he popularized it. Well, he invented TM.

Yes, he patented it. He literally trademarked it. As I understand it, a version of, if not the exact same thing that had been practice for 3,000 years. Yeah, which I'm conflicted about patents and trademarks on anything having to do with spirituality, because I think it's humanity's gift without trying to monetize it. But that said, I also, I think Gergiev, who's this great Russian mystic, said, you have

to charge for spiritual instruction because he said we don't value something we haven't paid for. Eckhart Tulley says the same thing. Yeah, so I think there is something to be said for the exchange of energy. My teacher, he would ask for a week's earnings and it was up to you to set what that was. But when people would ask me, like, what should I pay?

And I'd say, think of something and then add a little bit more. Like it should pinch a little bit. Just because you, if you give him a hundred bucks, you're not gonna sit in the chair every morning know, if you give them a hundred bucks, you're, you might, you're not going to sit in the chair every morning. But if you give them a thousand bucks, you might be more willing to try to get some bang for your buck. So I think, um, I think there's something to be said for that. But, uh, you know, mantra literally means mind vehicle.

And it's a, you know, you get a, uh, a mantra that's based on a number of different things, but, uh, kind of geared towards you and where you are in your life, I suppose, but it means mind vehicle and it's just an automatic poetic word that doesn't have any meaning. So sometimes people who come from heavy, you know, Christian, Jewish backgrounds, whatever they're like, oh, I don't want to get into this Hindu practice. And it's like, well, it's just a word that settles your mind. That's all it does, and it's the sound that settles your mind, there's no meaning to the word. But you're saying the word quiet.

You're saying the word with great, with, with, it's kind of a riddle to do it because you're encouraging effortlessness, which is in some ways a beautiful thing because it's the antidote to what we're doing in life which is pure effort all the time. So to close your eyes 20 minutes to twice a day and repeat as effortlessly as you can, which is actually quite difficult because you, how do you say something without effort? But even just the intention to think the mantra is the mantra. Just the intention, the awareness, I'm thinking the mantra, the mantra comes, does its own work because it's kind of,

and then you get into this phase where the mantra is just kind of doing its own thing. Now, the way I was taught is that thought in meditation is not bad, it's just stress release. It's just like the dirt coming off you in a shower. And there's no, you don't need to study the dirt at the bottom of it, you know, just rinse, just, just let it go. And then I like the, yeah, because thought is the thing that people get hung up on. They're like, I can't stop thinking. But it's like, well, you can't drive a stick shift

car until someone teaches you. I mean, you know, certain people say, well, I've tried to meditate and I can't. I said, what do you, what does that mean? I said, well, I tried to just sit with my eyes closed and, you know, not think impossible. It's actually impossible. So you really do need some sort of instruction. I mean, the thing I like about the mantra is it's an anchor in the midst of the dark wood of the mind. You know, like, like, okay, I'm being overrun by thoughts. And then you just come back to the mantra, come back to the mantra, come back to the mantra,

and then you forget. And, you know, the other crazy thing, it's the mantra's design so you forget it. It works at a very subtle, and it's to bring your mind to the kind of subtlest strata, you know, and to where you become, you know, what they call the simplest form of awareness, where you have no thought, but you're not asleep. It's like this really, and

you know, when you experience it, it's strange because the time goes by, you haven't said the mantra, but you're not asleep and you haven't had any thought. So this can happen in a 20 minutes set? Certainly. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. And then you come out and you feel, you know, that you've gone somewhere and you've touched

some sort of gold. And you come back and you just feel a little more efficient, a little kinder, a little, you know. I'm not, I think, you know, meditation is, I think that there's no accident that meditation and medication are only one letter off. And I think, you know, we're really medicated right now. And I think what everyone's trying to achieve through their medication, you know, we're really medicated right now. And I think what

everyone's trying to achieve through their medication. And I, and this is not a slam against pharmaceuticals, because I think some people might really need them. But I think a lot of what we're looking for is just some sort of relief from the, whether it's self-loathing voices or anxiety-producing voices or grievances like whatever overwhelms us whatever's aren't Our thing that just has us by the throat And there are these ancient practices from many different traditions that recognize this that said Yeah, the the greatest you know, it's like they say the mind is a wonderful servant and a terrible master

like we're we're we're enslaved right now to the mind. And now we have this hive mind called the internet, which is, we've never seen anything like it. So, to, you know, not fall prey to the voices and the noise, it feels more urgent to me than ever to stick with this. I fully agree. Hey, I'm Aresha, and I'm Brooke. And where the hosts of Wundery's podcast, Even the Rich, where we bring you absolutely true and absolutely shocking stories about the most famous families and biggest

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You can listen ad-free on Amazon Music or the Wondery app. The rubber hits the road in terms of the meditation being valuable in your life. So just thinking back to when you got this big role on how I met your mother and you were talking earlier about how it didn't make your life a non-stop bliss field. In fact, you couldn't escape, as you said quite pointyly from the human condition, even though you had what you ostensibly wanted. How was meditation and was meditation useful in that period? And just the ups and downs when you thought you shouldn't be happy. This just occurred to me because I remember,

I watched it the other night, but Jim Carrey did something at the Golden Globes last year that I thought was like one of the best things I've ever seen on television where he was introduced as two-time Golden Globe winner, Jim Carrey. And he said, yeah, that's right, I'm two-time Golden Globe winner, Jim Carrey. And he goes, when I go to sleep at night, I don't, I don't dream normal dream. He said, no,

I dream about being three-time golden globe winter gym carry because then finally, I would be enough. And I could stop this desperate search for something that won't, I know ultimately won't make me happy. And it was so bracing to hear someone come into a room where everyone's hungering for these little gold idols, which feels very much like what they said in the Old Testament, like don't worship that. You know, that's not what it is. And everyone's hungering, now look,

I'm not gonna turn down a golden globe, they wanna give me one, I'm not saying, I'll protest the ceremony. I'm just saying, it was bracing to hear someone come in the room and said, I've won two of these. It didn't solve anything for me, you know. And it's not, it's just, you know, you can feel emptier. One of the things, the reasons people, you know, CEOs of Fortune 500 companies are depressed

and movie stars try to kill themselves is because on the other side of the velvet rope is not the thing they told you would be there. I mean, we're operating under a lot of delusions around success and money and all these things. So I think it's actually good on some level. Like if you want them, get them to disprove to yourself that that will save you. Then you can go about the real work of getting quiet.

I was actually, I came across this quote from Pascal, Blaze Pascal, is that I don't know, the French philosopher, who said, all of the world's problems stem from man's inability to be quiet in a room by himself. I love that. And I tweeted it, and it's funny how some people really understand what that means If you don't understand what that means you'll think no, we just need cooperation or man needs to stop being so stupid You know people wrote to me and I said no no no

It means that what we're talking about it can't get cooperation without the without quiet Yeah, you know and the people I think who really have been deep change agents in the world, the Mandela's and the Gandhi's. And these were people who were rooted in that place, like absolutely rooted in that still place, and negotiated from that place, and said no, and yes, from that place, and led people from that place. And I just think, you know,

your question was about, you know, how it helped me navigate success in some way. Like the overwhelming success. Well, you know, one of the things that happens with success is you metabolize it very quickly. So one day you were auditioning for pilots and the next day you're on it, hit TV show and somehow it all feels normal because you just show up for work every day with you know, other famous people who are your friends and you're just working with them and

you're making a show and I didn't even watch the show that much like other people know the show a lot better than I do, you know, so you know there's a term for what you're describing. What's the hedonic adaptation? Oh, is that right? Yes, like it's a version of hedonism. Yeah. When something good happens to you, you so quickly bake it into your baseline. Yes. You don't appreciate it anymore. Oh, 100%. And I actually heard this thing that the reason time moves so slowly when we're young is because everything's new. And we're taking it in for the first time. And when we get older, we're young is because everything's new and we're taking it in for the first time and when we get older We're actually not

Serving the world in a in a vital way and make sense and then things just speed up because we're not taking it in you know I remember so strongly How long a summer felt when you're a kid how long a year a school year and now it's like You know things just go so I think I think, you know, the anchor of waking up meditating or even meditating in my dressing room, when I directed my first film, if they were lighting for 20 minutes, I would grab a 15, 20 minute meditation just, you know, on a folding chair in the quietest space I could find.

And have you read David Lynch's book? Catching a big fish. Yeah. It's another book I have not read but I'm not. It's terrific and it's totally worth reading but he really thinks that meditation is the the kind of that's where he digs and gets all that weird stuff. It's the wellspring of creativity for him. Yeah. And I actually, I don't do that kind of meditation, but I mean, to me, I get an enormous flood of ideas. Oh, yeah.

The more I meditate. Me too. And I also found that a lot of people work really well with a lot of stress, a lot of anxiety, depression or heartbreak is where a lot of their, a lot of anxiety, depression or heartbreak is where a lot of their creativity springs from. I am not that person. I work much better when I'm connected to that quiet, when I'm meditating, when I'm praying, when I'm,

when I just feel like I'm hooked into something larger than myself. Elizabeth Gilbert gave a really brilliant TED talk about creativity, how it used to be a genius with something outside of you, this kind of exogenous entity that you kind of prayed to, like, all right, genius, we're going to start writing. And then something disastrous happened when we became the genius, like, oh, I'm a genius. And she thinks this is really psychologically unhealthy, and I agree, you know, when I can petition to something larger than myself for inspiration, and then not ultimately take credit for it, that's what the Bhagavad Gita says, you know, do the action, but the fruits of the labor are not yours. And so, when I, when I can get quiet

and feel like I'm hooked into that kind of conveyor belt of creativity that is much bigger than me, I somehow feel like I'm going to be okay. I might be okay. And reading books that feel nourishing, cutting toxic people out of my life, one of the things I got really good at was when you're on TV, you can feel very strongly when people want to hang out with you for the wrong reasons. You know, and I just got my GPS really strong about sizing people up and what their intentions were. And when you meet someone that has never seen your TV show and doesn't know who you are, but they're fascinating to

talk to, you kind of hold on to them for dear life, because you say like, you could be a real friend. And I have some deep friends that I was friends with from before the show. So I think, you know, I'd like to write maybe an extended piece on, and I gave a talk in India about it last year in Mumbai at something called the Inc. Conference, which was essentially a spiritual approach to celebrity. You know, how do we, how did I navigate, like if I didn't want to be a? If I didn't want to be a jerk and I didn't want to be a drug addict or an alcoholic and I didn't want to be an agoraphobic weirdo

who never left the house, like how was I gonna deal with this weird aspect of my life? It's what Romdos calls, he says whatever your life is, that's your yoga. That's your practice. If your mother's sick, that's your yoga. If you're on a hit TV sick, that's your yoga. If you're on a hit TV show That's your yoga, you know, if if you're getting evicted or if you're a landlord like that's your yoga. So

I just tried to really look at what was in front of me and just say like, okay, and It sounds silly to talk about you know being on a hit TV show is being a spiritual struggle, but it was, and it continues to be. And I don't know, I mean, do you find success to be, it's complicated thing. It is, it's complicated. Because you also can't complain about it to a lot of people. Yes. You know what I mean?

Exactly, right. So you, it's isolating. Yeah. You know, there's very few people that want to hear you complain about being. But it's also a complicated thing. I mean, I don't You know, I there are vastly fewer people who are gonna come up to me in Times Square than to you, but The and for me that's not really where the issue lies personally. It's more that It's what you said about the resume virtues versus you,

the eulogy virtues, that once you get some, you taste of some success, you have five minutes where like I can't believe this happened. I wrote this book, I didn't think anybody's gonna read it but I have people reading it and then you're like, what's my next book gonna be? Why are there more people reading it? Oh, it's endless.

And when, I mean, if you go on a publicity tour about like a movie you may like Movies of you know, I've written directed starred in they've gone to Sundance. They've won awards I'm out publicizing them. They say so what's up next and I'm like wait I just can I have a break like I just did this thing and then you start going what's next, you know like I remember when I I was talking to some, I signed with a publicist because you, at a certain point, you need a publicist to help you navigate the thickets of publicity,

which when I was, wanted to be a theater actor in New York, the idea that I would have a publicist sounded grotesque, but you can't do without one at a certain point. But my first publicist, I said to her, because I'm on a hit TV show now, do I have to try to become a movie star? Is that something I have to now try to do? Like, is that what we're all trying to do?

And that didn't entirely appeal to me, but I thought, well, what do I do? Like, what am I supposed to do? And if I'm just on a hit TV show, and then I'm never heard from again, am I gonna be like the sad guy who whatever happened to so-and-so? Yeah, you know what I mean?

So, there are, I'm just as much in the grip of that egoic stuff as anyone, but I also, I'm also trying to run the marathon, and I know that after you have a very visible success, I think it's okay to go away for a while or do something quieter for a while. So, where are you with that now? It's been two years since the show. Yeah, I mean, I was on Broadway last year in a play called Disgrace, that was amazing and I filmed two seasons of this show Mercy Street on PBS which has been extraordinary. I'm doing a play at Lincoln Center right now. I've made a couple small movies. I made a gorgeous movie with my favorite

band called Cloud Cult which is like this very intensely spiritual and awake band from from Minnesota, Wisconsin and I'm pretty close with them now but we did this film called The Seeker that was that I helped produce that was Just an hour long it goes. It's a silent film. That's just scored by their new record And you know it's an extraordinary experience and really small like maybe just for Cloud Cult fans I don't know it's And you know, it's an extraordinary experience and really small, like maybe just for cloud-called fans. I don't know. It's gonna, you know, they're gonna do a couple of tug screenings and people will see it and you'll be able to get it. But, you know, things that just meant something to me. Like, someone asked me about a job I did and I said, I don't know if it changed the world, but it changed me. And that's what I'm doing right now is like, what opens my heart?

What makes me feel like, okay, I can spend two months or six months or a year working on this and feel 100% yes. And so how do you manage, because I imagine it's still there, the little screaming voice that says, oh well, what's your next big quote unquote big thing? Or can you shut that out and just be, because you seem pretty happy with what you're doing right now, so maybe that's just a joke. I mean, I am, but then, you know, okay, so I've worked non-stop since I left. I mean, really, I just haven't stopped working. And then, you know, a Brazilian teenager writes

you on Twitter and says, hey, man, when when are you gonna do something again? You know what I mean? Because they're not watching PBS. You know, they're not watching PBS. They're not, they're not coming to Lincoln Center to see your play. So they think you just went away. And so you, you know, you don't want to be led by the Brazilian teenager voice in your head,

which nothing against Brazilian teenagers. They're lovely. But, you know, there's a, you've got to negotiate, you know, what's bringing you some sense of fulfillment. I mean, the sweet spot would be something that is, I talk about my friend Ben Lee and I wrote a, this is another thing I did. I wrote an album with my friend Ben Lee,

who's not Australian singer-songwriter. One of the first talks we had, and we actually met on the set of How I Met Your Mother because they used a song of his and he liked the show and wanted to come by and we became friends. And weirdly, I ran into him when I was waiting to see my meditation teacher and he was living across the street from where he was teaching. And he said, what are you doing here? I said, I'm meeting my meditation teacher and he asked what it was. I told him he said, he taught me to meditate in Australia when I was 19. So we learned from meditation from the same teacher. It was so weird. But I, you know, one of our first talks we had was, how do you be both good and popular? Like what do you know? Like there's that feeling of like, okay, either I'm a salad making, Dreck and lots

of people watch it, or I do something good that no one sees. And I don't, I don't really subscribe to that because I think there's quality things out there that people watch. And I think that people do know the difference of, and look, there's still a lot of terrible things that a lot of people watch, but there's also a lot of good things that people watch. So I wanna make good things, you know?

And I wanna contribute something valuable to the atmosphere because I feel there's a lot of toxicity out there, there's a lot of noise and I feel like if I could make something that was informed by my eulogy virtues, by my spirituality, by my centeredness, I feel like that translates, that jumps out of the screen of people and people say, oh, I felt altered by this

or this felt different than something. I didn't feel like I was being screamed at. But in that way, some of the work I've done, you know, like this beautiful film with cloud-cult, the seeker, that's a film that whispers. That's not a film that'll scream and grab you by the lapels. That's a film you got to lean into. You got to seek it out. You know, so, you know, I wish I had a billion dollars in a distribution arm and I could just, you know, advertise on buses of everything I want and care about. But I'm still, you know, another thing is, and this is why I love this play I'm doing the Babylon line right now, it's about two people who think they're in the end of their

story, they think they're in a tragedy, but it's revealed they're actually in just in the middle of their story. And I think one of the things that our mind does is it makes us think we're always at the end, but really you're just in a middle chapter of your story. So who knows? I mean, I, I, I, I, I, how am I, your mother might be my great popular success. I mean, it might be.

I hope it's not. I suspect I'll have some other things that we'll get seen and noticed. And I'm just gonna keep making things that light me up, you know, because I think I have good taste. I mean, that's the only thing I have to go on, really. I think, I mean, just, I'm not your manager, your advisor, but as somebody who just met you and already likes you,

I would say that's the right strategy. Like, what other choice do you have? You're in a privileged position, you were on this hit show, which means that you don't have to like work every second of every day to survive. And so just do the stuff you love and hope that, and then don't worry about it in some level. Yeah, and I think, you know, it's funny,

the filmmakers like Woody Allen or the Cohen brothers, I remember the Cohen brothers were so mystified that True Grit was this like crazy hit. They didn't understand why, why that and not any of their other films. And raising Arizona was a pretty big hit, right? Yeah, but I don't think they'd had as big a, you know, like a hundred million dollar hit. I don't think they'd had that maybe not ever. I think True Grit was their highest grossing film.

And so it's great movie, you know, but I think that their, you true great was their highest grossing film and so great movie. It's great move You know, but I think that they're You know like Woody Allen he didn't know why midnight in Paris. He thought his greatest comedy was Hollywood ending like I think There's something about people who just keep making films or keep going that really appeals to me and like like Like Krishna says to Arjun on the Bhagavad Gita like the the fruit of the laborer, that has nothing to do with you. Correct. Make it. That was my point. Just keep making it. So I'm just gonna keep making stuff

and I feel like I'll be surprised and then I'll be disappointed and then I'll be surprised again. And none of it matters. What I'm really interested in having is a body of work that I can look back on and say, I stand by all these choices. I know why I did these.

I feel good about the reasons I did these, I feel good about the reasons I did these and I feel good about the final product. What would you say to a young, let's just say actor, but it could be anybody who's young, up and coming, super ambitious wants to make his or her mark. What would your advice be? Honestly, and I'm not saying this because I'm on this podcast, I always tell people get a meditation practice because I think that, you know, the only advice I have to give is like, be raised by Carolyn Allen, Radiner in this town, go to these schools

and then get this agent and then do these jobs. Like, I only have my own biography, you know, to reference. And it was a very particular thing that brought me, you know, where it brought me, but everyone else's path is gonna be so particular. And I think that getting quiet, you know, for some time during the day, especially in the midst of this noise we've been talking about, both internal, you know, individually and collectively,

there's just a lot of noise. You'll be able to hear the guidance. You know, one of the things I think meditation does is it strengthens your instinct. It strengthens your ability to kind of size people up quickly. You can read, like I said, that kind of vampiric energy coming from people. And you go, you know what, I'm going to back away from this. This doesn't feel safe and healthy to me. And then there are other people that you think,

no, this feels good, I like what they're about, I like what they're saying. So you've got to make a lot of snap quick judgments in this industry that I'm in, you know, about who you're gonna collaborate with. So I think, you know, also breathing, you know, just the basics. Like we lose ourselves.

And I think if you're so focused on the next thing, you're not really paying attention to the opportunities that are actually are coming your way. And so I think getting a meditation practice and finding a way to be creative every day, like I tell actors if you can write and you're not writing, it's like a dereliction of duty. Look at how many people are creating their own work right now and what that's doing for

them, you know? I think also you know yourself better than other people, you know how to write for yourself better than other people, you know what talents are not being exploited and paid attention to. So exploit them yourself. I don't know if that's the right word, but you know what I mean. Yeah. But before we go, can you just tell us more about the play you're in right now? Yeah, it's called the Babylon line.

It's at Lincoln Center right now in the Mitzi Newhouse. Just a couple of blocks from here. It's a play by Richard Greenberg who's a terrific Tony award winning writer. He wrote, take me out among another other beautiful plays. And it's about, I play a blocked poor writer in the 60s living in the village who, to make a couple extra bucks, he takes the train to Levitown Long Island to teach these Jewish housewives creative writing once a week. And there's a married woman in the class who is complicated but wildly talented.

And my character, I'm also married. So we have, it's kind of about an emotional fare that never gets consummated. But it's also about writing and time and nostalgia and loss and perspective. And it's a really beautiful rich play. It's like a full meal of a play. It's a lot, it's very dense and language heavy.

So if that's your thing, you know, like if you really like words and ideas expressed beautifully and people struggling to find the right words for things, you know, this is all stuff that really excites me. Terry Kinney directed it, who's an amazing actor, but also one of the founders of Steppenwolf Theater in Chicago and the cast is amazing and yeah, it's just it was a great way to come back to New York and be in a play that felt, you know, it's a play I never could have written because it's so singular, the voice, but the themes of it really resonate with me and I just thought this is something would be great to lend myself to.

And how long will it run? Till January 22nd. We've been up for a little while. Actually. It's running now. We talked about some of the things you're working on right now, but I think people after listening to this are probably going to want to learn more about you and consume some of the stuff you've done. Sure. Yeah, yeah.

What else do we go on? Well, I wrote and directed two films, both of which were premiered at Sundance before being in theaters. The first one was called Happy Thank You More, please. And then the second film is called Liberal Arts, which I was in with Lizzy Olson and Richard Jenkins, Nelson Janney and Zach Efron and John Magaro. It's a great, great group. And, oh, I have a newsletter.

I'm doing like a monthly newsletter. If you go to my Twitter page, you can just look at it. Which are handled. Josh Radner. Yeah. And so I'm doing like a monthly thing where I just recommend things that are and I do a little essay, you know, I call it the Muse Letter. Actually, the followers named it not me, but I like the name. The Seeker might be available on CloudCalt's website, but there's going to be a couple of screenings around the country coming up in the new year. There's a great film called Afternoon Delight that Jill Soloway directed who created Transparent.

That's her first film. I'm in that. And I just shot a film in Austin. That'll be hopefully, you know, hit in some festivals. And I'm always working on stuff. You're fascinating, dude. Really appreciate you coming in. Yeah, it was good talking to you.

Really? Thanks for the opportunity. I'm glad you're bringing meditation to people. This is so great I I always think like you know given the madness of what's going on It all feels so crazy and you know you almost feel like your impulses like get louder But I actually feel like no no we got to get quieter like then we'll figure out what to do that the solution lies there All right There's another addition of the 10% Happier Podcast. If you like it, I'm going to hit you up for a favor.

Please subscribe to it, review it, and rate it. I want to also thank the people who produced this podcast, Josh Cohan, Lauren Efron, Sarah Amos, and the head of ABC News Digital, Dan Silver. And hit me up at Twitter, Dan B. Harris. See you next time. [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ Hey, hey, prime members. You can listen to 10% happier early and add free

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