Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris - A Radical Buddhist Approach To Making This The Best Year Of Your Life | Vinny Ferraro

Episode Date: January 1, 2025

Contemplating your own death can feel like a massive bummer at first, but there’s good news: how you react to that inescapable fact really matters. Vinny Ferraro has practiced insight meditation (vipassanā) since the mid-90s. He’s the Guiding Teacher of the Big Heart City Sangha in San Francisco and has led a weekly sitting group for almost two decades.As a fully empowered Dharma Teacher thru Spirit Rock/IMS, he has taught residential retreats at Spirit Rock, Insight Meditation Society, and the Esalen Institute. Currently, he leads Spirit Rock's Year to Live course and teaches retreats and daylongs through Big Heart City and meditation centers across the country.He is a respected leader in developing and implementing interventions for at-risk populations. leading groups in schools, juvenile halls and prisons since 1987. He has led emotional intelligence workshops for over 100,000 youth on four continents.In this episode we talk about:Why it’s important to think about your own death even if you’re not expecting it anytime soonThe distinction between the actual conditions of your life and how much you sufferA practice called the five Daily Remembrances, which Dan started doing myself right after we recorded this — and which has made a real difference for himAnd some of other practices they do in the class, including the “life review” and “housekeeping”Related Episodes:Three Buddhist Practices For Getting Your Sh*t Together | Vinny FerraroHow Thinking About Death Can Improve Your Life | Alua ArthurJoin the waiting list for A Year To Live at Spirit Rock.Find out more about the Young Adult Retreat at Spirit Rock (taught by Vinny Ferraro, Matthew Brensilver, Cara Lai, and Hakim Tafari).Use code TENPERCENT for 10% off these two courses at Spirit Rock: Anxiety as Teacher: A Dharma and Yoga DaylongCultivating the Beautiful Factors of MindSign up for Dan’s weekly newsletter hereFollow Dan on social: Instagram, TikTokTen Percent Happier online bookstoreSubscribe to our YouTube ChannelOur favorite playlists on: Anxiety, Sleep, Relationships, Most Popular EpisodesFull Shownotes: www.meditatehappier.com/podcast/tph/vinny-ferraro-a-year-to-liveAdditional Resources:Download the Happier Meditation app today. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to 10% happier early and ad free right now. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple podcasts. This is the 10% happier podcast. I'm Dan Harris. Well, hello, my fellow suffering beings. Happy New Year. Today we're going to talk about a radical Buddhist approach to making this the best year of your life. Because it's a Buddhist approach, it may seem at first like a giant towering buzzkill, which I think is kind of hilarious.

I'll explain that in a moment. But first, let me tell you about my guest who is definitely not a buzzkill. Vinny Ferraro is a profane, hilarious, wise, tattooed, soul patch sporting Dharma teacher. He's the only guest I've ever had who routinely calls me bro. Long way of saying I love this guy. And so do you apparently. Last year when Vinny came on the show for the first time, I got more comments on that episode

than any other episode I've ever done. So I wanted to bring Vinny back to kick off this new year. And that brings me to the Buddhist buzzkill part. We are going to talk about a course that Vinny teaches called A Year to Live. So yeah, we're going to talk about death course that Vinny teaches called A Year to Live. So yeah, we're going to talk about death. The Buddhists really know how to party. But and this is key, this is actually and counter intuitively an uplifting conversation.

We're all dying anyway, so the Buddhists like to bring the issue of mortality into the forefront of your consciousness as a way to make your day-to-day life more vivid and urgent and interesting, rather than the sleepwalking and autopilot mode in which most of us live most of our lives. In this conversation, Vinny and I talk about why it's important to think about your own death, even if you're not expecting it anytime soon, the distinction between the actual conditions of your life

and how you feel about those conditions, a practice called the five daily remembrances, which I actually started doing myself right after we recorded this, and which has made a real difference for me. And we also talk about some of the other practices that Vinny teaches in the class, including the life review and something called housekeeping.

Two other things to say before we dive in here. First, a little bit more about Vinny. He's been a practitioner of insight meditation since the mid-90s. He's a co-founder of Dharma Punks and he's been the guiding teacher of the Big Heart City Sangha in San Francisco for 20 years. He also teaches to at-risk adolescents and to incarcerated populations. Second thing to say, this is Vinny's 16th year of teaching the Year to Live course, which is based on a book by Steven Levine. The course is offered through the Spirit Rock Meditation Center, a place I love. It's where I did my first meditation retreat.

The 2025 course starts in a few weeks and registration is open online right now. I'll put a link in the show notes for you. And if you can't do it this year, there's always next year if you survive. A little Buddhist joke for you, sorry. We also have some special discounts for our listeners to two other courses that Spirit Rock is offering, and I'll have more on that at the end of the episode. Vinny Ferraro coming up right after this.

But first, before we get started, I wanna let you know about what we're planning for the first few weeks of 2025. We've got a big series called Do Life Better. It kicks off in January to get your year off to the best start possible. On New Year's Day, we have a very special episode with the Dharma teacher Vinny Ferraro. The last episode we did with him, which was actually the first time he was ever on this show, I got more comments for that episode than anything I've ever done on the show.

So we thought bringing it back for the first day of the year would be a good move. And then we're going to follow up with a huge month-long pod series where we combine world-class scientists with Dharma teachers to help you actually do your resolutions. Meanwhile, over on danharris.com, we're offering a ton of resources and support, including a free seven day New Year's challenge. I will do live check-ins where you can ask me anything. We also have subscriber chats

about the most common resolutions like diet, fitness, and personal finance, dry January, stress reduction, and breaking up with your phone, plus exclusive access to transcripts of our podcasts and much more. To join, all you have to do is subscribe at danharris.com. Just go to danharris.com, type in your email,

click subscribe, and then I'll take care of everything else. Peloton has a variety of workouts for whatever era you're in, holiday era, running era, wellness era, whatever era of life you're in, Holiday era, running era, wellness era, whatever era of life you're in, Peloton has the classes and motivation you need to get after it. With Peloton's All Access membership, you can work out where you need it.

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I have one of the bikes. I use it all the time. I do some of the short rides, but if I have more time, I like to get in a 45-minute ride. It really calms my nervous system and helps me sleep at night. And when I'm on the road, like in a hotel, I'll often use the Peloton app on my phone to do a high intensity interval training class. I love those.

So long way of saying I'm a huge fan of Peloton. Find your push, find your power with Peloton at OnePeloton.ca. Vinny Ferraro, welcome back to the show. Thanks Dan, good to be here. Happy New Year. Thanks, bro, you too. Just to say, we're recording this far in advance of New Year, so that's a bit of artifice that Vinny is going along with very kindly.

Vinnie, let me start with a question that is not artificial at all, which is, what would you say to a skeptic who questions why there's any value in spending a ton of time thinking about the fact that we're going to die. Especially at the start of a new year. Yeah. I don't know if you ever saw the movie, The Consular. Do you ever see that? It's got that Fassbender guy in it and Ruben Blades. Ever see that? It's called The Counselor? The Consular. Yeah.

Consular. Brad Pitt's in it and a few other people. Anyway, there's a moment that he's talking to his mentor and he's in this life and death situation. He's like, you know, would you please tell me what to do? And the mentor is very relaxed and he goes, I would urge you to see the truth of the situation you're in. And there's something about that that just lands in my heart because we're all in this

situation. We're surrounded by life and death. It's one of the reasons I moved to the country. Every day we see this cycle of living and dying, especially just coming through the fall, right? Everything is dying. So we're all in this chapter, this season, we could say, of just looking at life and death, if we're honest about what we're seeing in this world.

So we can deny it all we want. Like we do. At least I was raised in a culture of denying death. The West is really good at that. Most times it's people's only ride in a limousine is the hearse. So it's like, weaken that Bernese. This is forever. We're all going to live.

And it's like, I've been touched deeply by death in my life. It helped me come out of that trance. So there is a gift in it. I have a million questions, but I just want to clarify. The movie, which I now I'm going to watch probably tonight is C-O-N-S-U-L-A-R, Consular? C-O-U-N-S-E-L-O-R. I'm not trying to correct Dan Harris. I'm just saying.

Yeah, the Consular. The Consular. Okay. Like a camp counselor. He happens to be a lawyer, but they call him the counselor because he provides counsel. Yeah, it's an interesting film anyway. You should see that conversation

because what Ruben Blades does, he's actually kind of riffing on a Antonio Mercado poem in this scene anyway. I don't wanna digress too much. The central point you're making though, and that Ruben Blades is making, is that if you are in denial of the ground truth, the non-negotiable fact that this thing is gonna end,

you are setting yourself up for quite a bit of suffering. And not only yourself, not only yourself, bro. You've talked with Frank Osteczki, yeah? Yes. Yeah, so he's a great mentor to me, along with Stephen and Andrea. He wrote in his book, he goes, to think that you're going to be able to close out all your fears and deal with these big issues at the end of your life while you're sick and probably on medication is a ridiculous gamble, right?

If we don't want to do it now, it would ever help that we have. What makes us think we're going to be able to break the chains later on down the road? You know what I mean? So it's inspiring because when we go to hospitals or we go to emergency room or when we live through COVID, whatever it is, right? Whatever wakes us up out of that trance. We can be grateful for that. We don't have to go through this life without ever pondering this deep mystery

go through this life without ever pondering this deep mystery and doing some of the work that it takes to meet that, to meet that reality so that we don't pass it on to our kids and to the people that are left behind while they're grieving. They got to try to figure out what Dan Mina wanted. You know what I mean? what Dan Minow wanted. You know what I mean? So you're saying there's an autopilot that we all walk around in, unless we're willing to take a look at this hard truth. Well, that's true, right?

Isn't it true for you? Death touches you, right? And all of a sudden it's some big Jerry Maguire moment, like, oh my God, I'm gonna be this, from now on I'm always gonna make sure. And then we go back to sleep. It's the nature of mind, this forgetting. Yeah, the other thing I say about it is like,

I think that's what we're working against in practice, this practice of mindfulness or meditation, whatever you call it. It's the mind's ability, it's uncanny to turn miraculous into the mundane. You know, same old shit. Then you wake up out of it and you're like, Oh my God, you know, we hold the ones near us closer for a while. And then, you know,, slowly we go back to sleep. Yeah, so what you're driving at there is that not only do we want to get in touch with the fact of our own finitude and the finitude of everybody and everything around us, but it's not enough to do it episodically. You want to do it systematically. That brings me to the Buddhist practice

of the five daily remembrances. Can you walk us through those? Oh, of course. That's really what I wouldn't say got me interested in it, but the directness of the five remembrances, it brings it up in a daily way, because that's what the Buddha asked of us, is to recollect it in the morning

and recollect it at night. I am of the nature to grow old. There's no way to escape growing old. That's the first recollection or remembrance. I am of the nature to have ill health. There is no way to escape having ill health. I am of the nature to die. There is no way to escape death. All that is dear to me and everyone I love are of the nature to change. There is no way to escape being separated from them. And then the fifth one, my actions are my only true belongings. I cannot escape the consequences of my actions. My actions are the ground on which I stand.

So they've been pretty undisputed for the last 2600 years. Yeah. I mean, they stand. Any mature person has to sign off on all five of these. And they may come across as kind of a buzzkill. You know what I mean? Like, you know, there was certain somberness. It's like, yeah, I know, but geez, bro, can you just kind of lift it up a little bit? But I think this is the Buddha's instruction. It's a wake up call to the way things are in actuality. A lot of paths have a very comforting story, some way that sooth the heart, but the Dharma, sometimes it lands with the subtlety of a sledgehammer. And I think that's what we need sometimes, that Manjushri sword that just cuts through

the illusion and says, no, look, this is the true nature of reality. I remember when I was first getting interested in Buddhism after our life, lived as a dedicated atheist. And also having spent so many years as a TV reporter covering involuntarily, because my boss made me do it, covering faith and spirituality for ABC News and being exposed to various dogmas, Mormonism, evangelical Christianity, radical Islam, because I covered a lot of overseas wars and being pretty turned off by a large percentage of it. Not all of it, but a large percentage of it. And then finding Buddhism where first of all, there is no God, and the guy who's at the center of it, the Buddha, says, take nothing that I say at face value, just test it all out in the laboratory of your own mind.

The exact words were, come see for yourself. And unlike these other religions that are promising heavenly rewards, and yeah, there are actually some rewards on offer within Buddhism, but generally speaking, it's asking you to embrace what is going to destroy you. It brings up a bigger question for me, Dan, which is like, well, what do you take yourself to be? That's the $64,000 question, no? Who is this Dan Harris character? Seriously, I mean you of all people have to know the layer cake of facades that is identity. You're

literally a TV personality dude. How many Dan Harris's are there? Like off the top of your head, how many Dan Harris's are there? Like off the top of your head, how many Dan Harris's are there? Well, there's the version who's a father, version who's a husband, version who's a friend, the version who's a podcaster, the version who goes on TV and says some shit sometimes. I was actually a game show host for a while, which I loved. Many, many versions will get there in this conversation,

although I think we've kind of already gotten there. One of the liberating insights, and it doesn't sound liberating at first, but one of the liberating insights ultimately of talking about death is who's dying anyway? And yeah, I thought about calling this episode New Year, No You, because that's really what we're talking about. In a way we are, right? The not self doctrine of Buddhism can be wildly misunderstood. When I heard it, what do you mean there's no self? I got so many selves coming out of my ears.

I don't even know what to do with all these different selfs that I call Vinny. I think the five recollections or five remembrances, they're there to soften our resistance that comes naturally when we hear them, so we don't feel so surprised or betrayed when any of those things happen. So it has this very normalizing quality. So we don't spend our life asking the wrong questions. Like this is reality. Can you get up with reality? Because this is the truth. And I like that. And I love what you just reminded me of around the Buddhist instruction to not take his word for it. Come and see for yourself that he trusted us.

And I think that's what I have faith in. I don't have faith that 2600 years ago a prince found the truth. I can revere the Buddha, but the fact that he said, look, come and see for yourself. And he had faith that even somebody like me could understand that directly. That's great faith. Yes. That's a faith that has a real foundation, which is your own capacity to improve, to wake up, to understand things more deeply.

Let me go back to the five remembrances because the first four make sense to me. I don't like them, but they make sense. I'm of the nature to get old, to get sick, to die. Everybody around me is going to change or die. And then the fifth seems like a digression or a non sequitur that my only true possessions are my actions. So can you explain how that fits? Yeah, when I read them, this is what's going to be taken away.

My health, my love for and so on. These things are like distractions and what's left. So the last one is what's left. How you do this moment matters. It may not feel like it. That's another thing that we work with in the practice is like how I respond to this reality that's before me, whatever it is.

That's what leaves the flavor, the taste in my mouth is my response. So he talks about all the things we're going to lose. And then he says, this is what you have left. This is the bedrock, karma. And that is good news. Like if you're living correctly, if you're living in alignment, you can trust that each moment conditions the next.

And that is going to be true moving forward as well. So I love that last one because it's most people receive the doctrine of karma as some sort of payback, some sort of vendetta, some cosmic scorekeeper. But really when I read it, I see the light of the world is karma. That everything is born out of causes and conditions. It's not just chaos. But let me press you on this kind of playing skeptic when I'm not really that skeptical. But you called it good news. But how is it good news that all that's left is our karma, the compounding interest of

our prior actions? How is that good news when we're still gonna fucking die? Yeah. I think I find it empowering in some way when you ask me that question. I mean, what fucking dies anyway? Yeah, what part of me dies? Is it just this body? Am I going to be stuck in some loop of my own mental projection at death?

This mystery. But I think that's the one uplifting thing of the five recollections. He's delivering all, and it kind of lands with this doomsday cynicism. Like, OK, OK, OK, OK. And then finally, he's like, he gives us this kind of key to unlocking how this life unfolds and that is our actions. That's why I think it's sometimes referred to as the light of the world. I wasn't given an owner's manual on how to do this life, but the closest thing I got

is the Buddhist teachings. And the fact that each moment conditions the next, I find that incredibly empowering because that means it's not too late. No matter where I am, if I can get the heart involved, it's going to be to everyone's benefit. So that feels empowering in a life where everything's going to be taken. There's something about like, and it still matters how you do this moment. But again, you're still going to die.

No doubt. That is no doubt. It's not a get out of jail free car. It sounds like you're looking for something that transcends that reality. And I think the architect, the Buddha, when he laid it out, it was really to soften our resistance to these truths so that we can be mature about it and say, okay, yeah, that's still true. We're all going to die. Yeah, I'm going to be separated from what I hold dear.

Like I said, I think that's a tenderizing quality to these truths that wake us up. And, you know, most of the time I don't want to be woken up. It's generally through the suffering, no? I mean, have you grown through the good times, Dan? And when you look back on your life? Generally speaking, if I interpolate back through my life, it's been the hard stuff that has provoked the most growth. Although I think both of us would agree that the overwhelming joy, the sort of mundane glory of having a kid can, which I know comes

with its own suffering, especially right at the beginning, so much joy, that can provoke a lot of growth. Totally, yeah. It is one of the great joys that many of us have the honor to know. And when I look back at my life, it was the suffering that woke me up. Just about every time. The suffering is what gets us ready to hear the truth. So we can stop pretending that this is going to go on forever and that I'm okay in all

situations. All the kind of lies that we tell ourselves so that we can continue on with the charade. So I like the Dharma doesn't pull punches. I love that he gives it to us very directly. Yes. I love it too. So let me just go back to this fifth of the five remembrances. What I hear you saying, which I agree with, is the first four can sound pretty grim, although

I think if you hear them in the right way, they can also be really vitalizing and enlivening because it pulls you out of the dream, it pulls you out of the matrix, it pulls you out of the autopilot. And the fifth lands as more good news, which is, hey, it's never too late as long as you're alive, you are the heir to your actions. You always have this choice to do the right thing, to do the helpful thing, and that will condition more goodness going forward. So that all, if I'm hearing it correctly, lands quite well with me. I think, though, and I wasn't around at the time of the Buddha, but to the extent, and I'm not a Buddhist

scholar, but to the extent that I understand anything about Buddhism. The Buddha really talked a lot about reincarnation, rebirth, and I suspect in his time, this fifth of the five daily remembrances also kind of landed as a kind of heavenly reward. Like, look, if you do a good job in this life, you might be reincarnated in the heavenly realms later. What did Suzuki Roshi say after 50 years of practice and they asked him to encapsulate his teachings or the Dharma, they're like, well, what have you learned? He goes, not always so. We have to get comfortable with uncertainty

because this whole life is uncertain. None of it is guaranteed. None of it. If we're alive long enough and just looking around, wow, there's a lot to let in. And then the fact that there is no one that's not in this situation, if that's not a cause for compassion,

that is not about us. That no matter how many views your podcasts get or how many people love their idea of Dan Harris, you are of the same nature I am. That is true for all beings, this binding contract that we sign that rides alongside us with all of life. And it's never not true. And I think that's beautiful. You know, there's something about it that feels equalizing.

I know you're not a very poetic person or very sentimental, you know, and I appreciate that about you, but there is an incomprehensible preciousness when you see these recollections, these remembrances playing out in people's lives. I was just thinking like yesterday I went to a NFL game with my son, but then we went to the airport. So just sort of moving through crowds of people and all of my judgments are there based on my past conditioning and my biases, whatever. It's easy for me to just as it is for everybody to otherize.

But if in my moments of waking up, what I can remember, oh yeah, we're all on the same bus here going who the fuck knows where. Well, then it just makes it a lot easier to be friendly, either internally or externally, attitudeally or behaviorally to everybody because we're in this mystery together. And that's the true truth. To know that we're going to be separated, even from your son. How gentle does that land in your heart? Right? The shit I'm tripping about. That's what it wakes me up out of. It's like, what have I been focused on here? Sometimes

it's a little bit of sadness because like, holy shit, I've wasted years trying to figure out what the fuck is wrong with people. Why are people so stupid? And it's like, yo bro, check it out, dude. You've just spent the majority of your life trying to figure out why people are stupid. How smart is that? You know what I mean? It's a reflective path we have to ask ourselves.

Okay, you've crunched the data. People are stupid. All right, go. So I like the tenderness that it delivers. How much more respectful, compassionate, present we might be with the ones there to us and the people that we don't even know. Somebody give me the finger yesterday

because I might have slowed him down by about a second in traffic. And it's just like, oh man, my heart goes out to him. Like if that can cause you to wish harm upon me. Just the idea of waiting a moment. It's just like, wow, what a fickle grasp on happiness. And I know that vibe. Compassion comes easily when we start seeing it through this lens.

Yes. My son asked me recently, what's the deal with the finger, the middle finger? And we talked to chat GBT about it. So take it with a grain of salt. Could have been a hallucination, but apparently this goes back all the way to the Roman Empire and they called it, I believe, the digitus impetus, the impudent digit. Though there's a real history to the middle finger. It's not a new thing. Okay. Having said that useless bit of arcana, I do have a practical question for you about

the five remembrances because I would say this is an area of Buddhist practice that I've been sleeping on. I mean, I'm aware of the five remembrances, but I don't bring them to mind as much as I now feel compelled to do. And so that's my practical question for you. How do we get in the habit? You said the Buddha recommended we contemplate these first thing in the morning and the last thing before we go to bed?

Like, do we print it out on a card? Do we get it tattooed on our forearm? Like, what's the move here? Yeah, I think that's a very personal question, right? For each person to figure out, how do I infuse my time? How do I infuse my perspective? So I like having things printed and putting them up. I like those kind of reminders.

I've covered my entire body with reminders of my true nature. Yeah. Because I forget. I forget a lot. Even my house, there's beautiful tankas and imageries of deities and it's like, oh, right, right, right. I got to keep remembering. Even my wife, my son, the people dear to me, they're also reminders of my own goodness. So whatever we have to do to have that deeply infuse my conditioning, because my conditioning is quite otherwise. My conditioning is, yeah, I'm an aversive type. You know, you know that suffering. I'm more of a greed type actually. I don't know bro. I think you're averse and you don't even want to admit that. I'm just thinking about how much I used to like drugs or food, sense pleasure.

I have a version in me too, by the way, for the uninitiated. In Buddhist circles, there are these three root poisons, the three things that tend to mess us up as humans, greed or desire, hatred or aversion, delusion or confusion. And a parlor game that Buddhists like to play is like, what type are you? Like, what's your predominant mode?

Is there an aversive type? Are you a greed type? Are you a deluded type? Are you a greed type? Are you a diluted type? And I absolutely have aversion, but I think primarily I'm a greed type. Although your diagnosis of me seems maybe I'm off. That's right.

Maybe I'm diluted. That's our little Briggs-Meyer, our version of the Briggs-Meyer's test. Sometimes they talk about it like, well, you know, you walk in a room and like, wow, I really like this rug rug would love to have a rug like this and then it's like oh You might be a great type and then the aversive type like myself might walk in yeah, but it really Kind of clashes with the curtain and then the diluted type cycle what rug kind of not really completely here

Yeah not really completely here. Yeah. So practically speaking, you have a lot of tattoos. I have one tattoo. I got a little acronym FTBOAB for the benefit of all beings, which has been very, very helpful for me just to have that right next to my watch to remind me, all right, yeah, I might be obsessing about how many downloads we have on this podcast or how my latest Instagram post did, but like, what's the real job here? And so, the five remembrances, that strikes me as, is it one of your tattoos? Would you recommend it?

I'm not saying everybody should listen to us about body art, but where are you on this personally? Yeah, I do not have a tattoo of the five remembrances but my my whole back is a piece that really bows to this idea that the Buddha put forth which is that conditions don't cause suffering. What a radical concept. I'm still trying to let it in because when conditions arise that are wildly unfavorable, I have to remember that it's my response. What am I going to do with it? We often talk as Buddhists about not wasting the suffering. Don't waste any of the suffering because every time we're suffering, it's an indicator to look a little closer to see what

have I not been seeing? Where am I running game down on myself? And I just want to say, to be explicit about it, I don't think every time we're suffering, it's because of our delusion or greed or even ill will. I don't believe that. And that's one of the gifts the Buddha gave us. He said, look, this whole thing, there's suffering here. Okay. I'm talking about the other 90% that is mostly manufactured and almost imaginary that we do have sway over. Some of it just comes with the territory and that's what I love that he normalized that. Okay, there's suffering.

Not that you're, they're suffering. Not that you're fucking this thing up, it's just they're suffering here. And then there's a whole bunch of suffering, secondary suffering, that we can do. Tremendous amount about how we're perceiving reality, this self. What is I, me, and mine? Veni Ferraro talks about how his experience of working with incarcerated people has changed his viewpoint on what freedom means, and we talk about the process of a life review and why it matters. If you are looking for a gift this holiday season, consider a subscription to the Happier Meditation app.

It is a way to help your loved ones build the mindful life they want with a personalized meditation practice designed to embrace what is real and messy and beautifully imperfect in themselves. Visit meditatehappier.com slash gift to share the gift of mindfulness this season. You got quite moved when you talked about how conditions don't cause suffering. And you have this, I can't see it because you've got a shirt on, but you've got a big tattoo you've referenced on your back that really goes right to that point. I'm just curious, how do you operationalize that insight in your life? That's a good question, bro. I'm a good interviewer. Thank you. You know, I've been very lucky, Dan, I've been very lucky to have teachers that were interested

in being of service. Steven and Andrea and then Frank Osteczceski, these people that were just like, okay, where are we going to work? Oh, we're going to work in prisons. We're going to work at the end of life. Why? Oh, because those people, they don't have the luxury of pretending anymore. They're serious about freedom, about awakening, about what the fuck is actually most important. As I walk through those worlds I'm reminded constantly the amazing things

I've seen. I wish I could just bring you in there with me then. One time where I used to do these daylongs, the kids in juvenile hall, they would let me take the kids with guards to this little retreat center so I could just get them out of there for the day. And we would do all these exercises. And usually by the end of the day, actually every time, the guards would kind of bend the rules for us. Because the ocean was only five, 10, 15 minutes from us.

And I'd say, look, man, these kids have been in this building for years. Can we just go look at the ocean? Just to be in touch with something so boundless. And so they would do it for us. And so they're very attentive. And if we have 12 kids and we're getting back in the vans, and there's only 11, I'm like, holy shit, man. Come on, bro, don't do this to me, man. Just go and fuck everything up.

And I start just jogging. I come to this bend on the ocean and he comes running, male, back to me. And I was like, oh man, thank God, go in the van. And I just wanted to walk around the corner to see, what was he doing? And I see in the van. And I just wanted to walk around the corner to see what was he doing? And I see in the sand being washed away by the water already. Huge. I'm free. For that moment, he knew a freedom. In that moment, I just feel like I have 10,000 moments like that of being lucky enough to watch someone,

to be with someone that's discovering that freedom amidst crazy conditions. We could still be free. And that's heartening to me. That's touching to me. That I've seen in hospitals and hospice and prisons and as I'm walking down the streets, I see that that is possible, that that's not some pipe dream of religion just trying to like placate me. That it could be right here and right now. It doesn't mean that everything changes, Dan.

Doesn't mean that my mom passes and I'm happy. But there's a freedom from always having to be happy. Right? Isn't that a great freedom? But if we don't saddle conditions with that, you have to constantly make me happy. It's pathological, man. Can you imagine that? You're on the altar with your wife and you're like, look, I'm going to stay as long as you make me happy. That would be a

short marriage, bro. Okay. So I can see the, I'm sure the listeners can hear the and see in their minds the vast power of not feeling like you always have to be happy not being a prisoner of conditions given that we can't control conditions most of the time. And so that just kind of leads to the how. And I suspect it's in learning how to be mindful because if you can be aware in the right way, then in some ways nothing can hurt you. It's like there's no, there are no problems

if you're aware in the right way. Am I close to describing what you're pointing out? You're close, and we're always close. Yeah. You know, we can wake up to this prison of preferences. It's like I ask myself, I don't know, many times a day, bro, is this worth suffering over? Some things are, right? Some things are actually worth suffering over, but actually not that many.

So I can find myself in this contraction of just like that tense, the resistance, very natural. Even somebody giving me the finger yesterday, right? It's like, huh, there's a tightening and then a softening. And in that moment, I can taste freedom. That he doesn't have sway over me, nor does his finger. That actually what he did was, there was a little bit of compassion.

Cause I have no idea. Maybe he's going to see his kid in the hospital. I have no idea what that person's holding, but I know the pain of aggression. So it's like, oh man, I hope your day gets better, do it. If this is all you need to get you off center, bro, may you be well. Let's say a little bit more about this class, One Year to Live. Some of the other exercises you do during the class, I think are worth discussing because

they're ones that these are mental exercises anybody listening can do right now. So let's, to the extent that we have, probably won't be able to get through all of them, but let's see if we can get through some of them. The first one on my list is life review. What is that? That's really one of the biggest, because what we wanna do in some way,

which is Stephen and Andrea's advice to us is like, what would it be like to close out all our accounts? You know, just make peace with our relationships. So when I look back on my life and I see the thousand relationships, let's put it more bite-size, let's say the ten most meaningful relationships to me. When I look back, what's the felt sense of that looking? You know, it might be gratitude because I love this person and they've given me pieces of their heart, whatever it is.

So it might be gratitude, but there might be some forgiveness. Maybe for myself, maybe for them, maybe for both of us. Sometimes it's a mix. So the Life Review asks us to take these relationships into account. What is needed here? What would be a deep low bow that says, if we never speak again, what do I want you to know?

Many times that opens up conversations that have been dormant for decades. Because there's a line in Steven's book, and actually I think it might be on the back cover or something. It always stuck with me. And he said, because you never know when the last year of your life begins. You just don't know, right? None of us get to know that.

So there's like this inspiration to say, take care of your relationships. So the life review, though it sounds daunting, we do it over the course of months. And I don't know, the year to live, maybe this would be my 16th time going through it. And I got to say that I'm continuing to unpack the gift that Stephen and Andrea gave us. And when I see people doing it, it brings up these conversations there enough. Like, well, what am I going to do with this body? What do you want me to do? You want me to sign a DNR?

Do I want to be hanging out with tubes in my throat? Like we get to decide instead of making them guess. So this is part of the year to live. I know I'm jumping ahead, but when I think about it, my favorite part of these courses are the people. As people show up and all of a sudden they don't know what this year is going to hold for them. Sometimes they get a diagnosis while they're in the class. They weren't sick in January, but by March they have a prognosis. Some people won't make it the year

and there's something incredibly precious about that time. And we get to do it together, right? You can buy the books, just many books. Frank's book, The Five Invitations, Sally Tisdale, right? The Advice for Future Corpses, and Year to Live, right? All of these books give very, very beautiful ways to explore this topic.

And it's a great place to start. And having the support of a community to look at that for a year, because it takes a lot of resolution and dedication to continue with a topic like this, that it's a great taboo. Nobody wants to talk about it. Maybe it won't exist if I don't talk about it, right?

So there's something about being able to do it in community, because no matter what I tell people about, like, well, this is not you, this is not I, me or mine, any of these concepts, when we hear other people talking about it, we understand ourselves in a different way. Like, holy shit, most of this is just my conditioning. I have all of these ideas about death, but I don't know for myself.

I know what I've inherited from my culture, from my family, from everything we're swimming in here, but I don't know it for myself. I think that is a worthy place for our attention. Yeah, DJ Cashmere, who's our executive producer, has done the course and raves about it. And hopefully this conversation is a nice dose of the wisdom that will be transformative even at this level. But let me just go back to Life Review for a second. Can you say exactly what it is?

So what it looks like, boots on the ground, we sit down, and some people write it, some people speak it into their phone, right? We set an intention to spend time going through our lives and completing those relationships as if they weren't going to continue into in perpetuity because they're not. So how do we make peace in our heart? I like to write so I can write it down and say, okay, here's my pops. Oh, here's my mom, yeah. She'd been dead 40 years, but this is how my heart feels.

Right? Oh, here's my wife, here's my son. What do I want them to know? And so this idea that we're gonna offer something, some piece of our heart to it. Like I said, it might be forgiveness, it might be gratitude, it might be equanimity that there was nothing that I could do, right?

Whatever it's feeling, we want to be with it and just let it sit in our system and say, okay, there's something needed here. Should I reach out to Dan? Maybe. Sometimes, a lot of times it doesn't have anything to do with other people in terms of I need to tell them something. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. Like forgiveness itself, right?

Sometimes it calls for action outside of this realm that I have to reach out and take some responsibility for something. But many times it's just like, can I be with this feeling and offer from my heart what I can to feel like it's complete? I do it maybe once a week, but we do it for a couple, two, three months and it deepens, you know, like an onion. Yeah. I might think about my pops and be like, no, no, we're good, bro. We're good. I've forgiven and I've gratitude for him and I wish him well. Cool, cool, cool. And then as the months it deepens, oh actually there's more to it. There's a little rock in my shoe. Okay, what do I really need to say? You know, and that way we don't waste

this time because right now we're alive. We can communicate, we can reassure, we can forgive, we can tell people what they've meant to us. Soon that will not be the case. So it's just about saying I want to dedicate. Some people do it an hour a week, some people do more. So it's really up to you and the conditions of your life and how much you feel like is left unresolved. Another of the practices is called housekeeping. What's that all about? Yeah, the housekeeping is the hundred other things that it takes to die. The advanced medical directive, the durable power of attorney, what are you gonna do with this body? What are you gonna do with your body, Dan?

Actually, you know, my wife and I went through a nine month training at the New York Zen Center for Contemplative Care, where we trained to be hospice volunteers and did a lot of the work that I think is probably also done in the year to live course. And so we made some decisions. And I have now forgotten what those decisions were.

I'ma hold the seat for you, bro. I got a seat for you and your sweetheart. But it's good because, you know, we don't want to leave this to people that have to guess and they're all bereft, right? Or they're dealing with some sudden hospital visit and they can't communicate with you and now siblings are fighting and it's just like such an injustice to the people that love us to not have done this work because it's just like such an injustice to the people that love us to not have done this work because it's uncomfortable.

It's like uncomfortable. What do you want to leave for the people around us? Allow me to digress. I don't think guilt should be the motivating factor. It has to do with love. We've all inherited lots from our predecessors. What did you inherit, Dan, culturally or, you know what I mean, emotionally even?

So much, mostly good. From my parents in particular, the example to live a life of where you're giving more than you're taking, to take care of your body through exercise, to take care of your relationships, especially your marriage. Those come to mind as the top cultural inheritances I got from them. And are they both still alive?

Yeah, 80 years old in assisted living. Wow, man, lucky, lucky Dan. Everything coming up Dan Harris, dude. Jeez. You'd be hard pressed to find a luckier human being. I feel the same way. I'd go toe to toe with you on that, bro. Except the objective facts of your childhood were way less cushy than mine.

And we grew up, you know, within 60 miles of one another. Yeah. But you know what they say, bro, that the real teachings are not placed in the heart. They're placed on the heart. So when the heart breaks, they enter. That's in the Taumut. So I had a jump on you there because this life can be heartbreaking.

I didn't expect to live a long life. And once you realize that I'm not even supposed to be here, then the rest is gravy. I don't have real problems. Right. Hell yeah! Everything is gravy after that. You're playing with the house's money.

I mean, I saw the AIDS epidemic. I saw the crack epidemic. I was part of that. I saw the ODs. I saw the violence. I've shot at people and been shot at. I ain't supposed to be here, bro. And yet, I get to be here.

What am I going to do with this day? One of my colleagues says, how can I claim this day for the Dharma? And I just love that. I wouldn't go back and redo my childhood. And I feel really grateful that I had such a comfortable, cozy, cushy upbringing. And yet a certain amount of heartbreak gives you a gratitude for each day that I have to work harder for.

Yeah, man. I mean, I can't imagine this world otherwise. I know from the beginning, I was a very sensitive kid. Things touched me deeply. Maybe it was art or music or death or suffering, right? I would see it. Even as a kid, I saw suffering. It used to just break my heart, you know,

because I was surrounded by it. I was like, wow. And I just couldn't understand how people could go on. I saw a callousness in the world that I didn't have that luxury. I just felt deeply impacted by my life and by suffering in particular. And I think it really got me ready. It primed me and set me running into the arms of the Dharma. We could say trying to find out how to accommodate so much heartbreak.

And I think all drugs are painkillers. We can check out in a thousand different ways. It could be eating, it could be sex, it could be success. You know, lots of gold stars, bro. I can't imagine how many gold stars you got. You've been super successful. And when I look at people, I'm like, oh, wow, like, um, maybe they're very good looking. That's like, or maybe they're very fit.

It's like, wow, man. I love these things. One of my friends used to say, people would always say something to her about, oh my God, I love your smile. And she's like, basically they're saying, congratulations on your face, because that has nothing to do with me. Yeah, she's good.

But as we get older, I can see it. The bags under my eyes, I'm slower to get up in the morning, right? Like all of these ways that change is actually happening all the time. What do we do with this aging? I was always the young one. Now I'm kind of like older dude.

And another thing when you were talking, I remembered, the year to live for me, it's not just about this body. It's not just about the life review. It's also about like, well, what part of me needs to die? There's so many kinds of deaths, right? The death of the body is a big one, yeah? But there's marriages or relationships that die. It's like the grief that happens naturally

if we change jobs and all of a sudden we're surrounded by all different people. You just change platforms, right? That had to die. Whatever that was, I was like, all right, deep low bow. Okay, and I think that there's moments in every life where we wake up and we realize, oh, I'm full of shit.

Right? Like, you know, it could be connected to a relationship or a vegetarianism or a church or it's like, oh my God, I'm living a lie. And so then we wake up out of that, right? We begin a new life. So when you talk about reincarnation, it seems like there's been a lot of chapters to this Vinnie Ferraro character So, I don't know what happens, you know what I mean like in the big reincarnation game But we keep coming back to this each moment conditions the next so we can see the rebirth in every moment

Coming up Vinnie talks about the fifth reminder and why it's actually perhaps the most important, or at least as he says, it's where the Buddha pulls the life out. And we talk about how a loss in his own family helped him find some more compassion. I want to go back to something you said about you notice the bags under your eyes, it's a little slower in the morning for you. This is my interpretation, so please correct me if I'm wrong, but while the Dharma encourages us to get intimate with our mortality, what it's not saying is let yourself go, don't exercise, don't take care of the body. And this is such a delicate thing

because we live in an era where, especially among men, there's all this emphasis on biohacking, which is just body dysmorphism under a sexier name. But there's also kind of a healthy part of it, where people are getting fit. And I can feel it in myself, like I like to be fit, and sometimes there's a healthy part of that, you know, where people are getting fit and I can feel it in myself, like I like to be fit and sometimes there's a healthy part of that and then there's

the unhealthy part where I'm comparing myself to other people or wanting to change specific areas of the body. This is a very complex realm, but on the simplest possible level, the five remembrances are not nudging us toward a steady diet of pound cake until we die. Accurate. Yeah, that's the fifth one again, right? The fifth one is saying, yeah, all these things are true and it still freaking matters. It still matters how you do this thing.

That's why I say it's like the saving grace. It doesn't push us toward nihilism. It's just like, yo, this is the truth. This is what you have influence over and the other four which you don't have influence over. So it's not telling us not to love them because they're going to leave. It doesn't say, hey, don't get a beloved dude because she's going to be taken. So that's what saves us from the nihilistic taste of those first four. It's like, yeah, this is what we have influence over and this is what we don't.

And you know, we don't like to be with uncertainty. When the fuck does the ego ever want to admit it has no idea what's going on? Seriously, think about it. We talk about death and it's this big mystery nobody knows. It's like, you know what? I'm not cleanly sneakers, Lope. You know what I mean? It's like anything but that, right? Because we don't want to be with uncertainty. We see it all the time. People running from uncertainty, they would even rather have bad

news than no news. Don't you think though, I mean, I have to imagine you agree with this, that actually starting to train the mind to marinate in the mystery, to live in the uncertainty, wow, shit, I'm going to die. This is all ending soon. What is it that the specials say that one of my favorite ska bands, enjoy yourself, it's later than you think. That feels good in a perverse way. Like you can train your mind to like stop cleaning

the sneakers and sit in the awe and wonder of, I'm gonna die. It's very fascinating. I mean, I'm honored that I get to be a part of these groups. And one of the groups that I facilitate within the Here to Live is the prognosis group. And these are people, it's not a theory. There's that famous exchange where somebody walks into a hospital

and they're seeing their friends. How does it feel to know that you're dying in the prison response? How does it feel to pretend that you're not? You know what I mean? So there's this wake up call that gets us in touch with what's most important here. When all else falls away, what the fuck am I doing with this life?

Even when I'm suffering, this perspective wakes me up out of my suffering. It's like, man, it's just not that freaking serious, bro. Because I have a long history of taking myself seriously. Real talk. In some ways, that brings us right back to the first question I asked, which is like, why the hell would we do this? Why would we spend any time, never mind New Year's Day,

thinking about the fact that this may be our last New Year's Day and that we're going to die? One part of the answer is what you just said there. It's like perspective is a great bomb on the shit you're worrying about. Hell yeah bro, because I guarantee if you're listening to this podcast, whatever conditions you're in, we know that they're bearable, right? But I don't know for me, I would put it in the top 90% of beings with love stepping for me and trade my conditions for their conditions. And I don't remember that when I'm suffering.

I'm like, no, this is bullshit. It's like, yo bro, you hit the lottery on me. I got to remind myself that I'm the luckiest person I know because of that. I was just teaching in Milan and I'm teaching to a bunch of Italians and it was just like, okay, how do I say this? It's not that you're naturally negative,

you're just naturally negative. Like, right? And the translator's looking at me, I'm like, oh man, I gotta try to find a way to say this, you know? But it's just our biological inheritance. It had nothing to do with the real us. So it's like, okay, can I see the difference between me and my conditioning?

Can I watch my conditioning arise over and over and not mistake it for self. And when I don't mistake it for self, it's a lot easier to let go. What does they say? Wisdom lets go having felt the pain of holding on. So you feel that contraction and you're not willing to do it anymore

because it hurts you. It hurts every time that contraction and you're not willing to do it anymore because it hurts you. It hurts every time that contraction at the heart, the sense of self that arises, that ego. But this is what I was getting at when I responded to your emotion earlier about your tattoo, about conditions don't cause suffering. It's if you can look at everything that arises in your mind, in the world, with mindfulness, meaning you're not judging it, you're not pushing it away, you're not clinging to it, you're not mistaking it for yours. And then at that point, that's freedom.

There's no suffering in that anymore. No matter how shitty the circumstances. I'm not saying this is an easy thing to do, but this is a practice we can get better at. That's what I heard when you got emotional about conditions don't cause suffering. Does that make sense? It does. There's so many instances where this has been the case

for me directly, where I'm like sitting in conditions that feel, I had an experience where I'm like sitting in conditions that feel... I had an experience where I was sitting in a courtroom and my niece had been killed by a drunk driver and we're just kind of like sitting in this courtroom with this young woman who was just drunk driving and happened to hurt someone I love, kill someone I love. And the judge left for an hour to go read all the things.

And so we got these two families, like 30 people on that side, 30 people on our side. And we're just like, I'm sitting there and I'm like, where is my refuge? I'm watching my sister try to give a victim impact statement. You know what I mean? It's like, they're only child. And I was just like, what am I doing here? I sat there, I was like, people looking across and they're pissed at us and we're mad at them.

And I'm like, I can feel it coming up in me, the aggression that doesn't wanna turn away because they took something from me and from my family. And they know that they're on the brink of losing someone they love to the prison system, which I don't feel like it's a rehabilitative place. So I'm sitting there in this great loss. And once I understood that there's no winners here, there's nobody going to walk out smiling and high-fiving,

that we're all in a similar situation. And then I can tenderize and just feel like, okay, can I send compassion to every person in this room? Because we're all in this. These conditions have come together, and what am I doing there? How can I not have anybody outside my heart in this wild, heartbreaking situation?

And I found that compassion. I'm so sorry to hear about your niece. Mm-hmm. Yeah. When did this happen? It was, uh, actually three years ago last week, so it's been in my mind, you know? Mm-hmm. Yeah. And the person did not even a year in prison. It's like hard to rectify in your heart, you know?

It's like I don't want that for anyone anyway. Well, but it's another reminder of how fleeting this whole thing is. Just what is Joseph Goldstein always says, anything can happen anytime and that story you're telling is just a vivid example of that and it goes right to the core theme of this whole conversation. This next breath may be the last one. I mean, really man, how many four moons you think you got left, dude?

Exactly. How many summers? Like, what was I focused on? I needed a nicer car. I wanted to get some Botox to tighten this whole thing up. Like, what was I doing while this was happening? Right? Well, like you said, so fleeting. That we never know what these courses are gonna bring, you know,

we sign up for these things. We don't know why. There's something in this that wants to check it out and see if it's a fit, see if it resonates. And we just don't know what this year holds, you know? So I mentioned earlier what part of us needs to die. Maybe some part of my personality, some behavior that's not serving me anymore. There's lots of kinds of deaths.

And I love that I can do this course, you know, 16 years and still be finding things in it for me. Vinny, before I let you go, because sadly we're out of time here, I know it's too late for people to sign up for this year's One Year to Live, but we'll put a link so that people, if they wanna investigate when they can sign up

for the next one, we'll put a link in the show notes for that. But what else are you putting out into the world? If people wanna take a class from you or hear more from you, how can they do that? Thank you, bro. Thanks for the opportunity to talk about it. Yeah, so if this actually happens on New Year's Day,

it actually won't be too late because we start at the third week of January. So if they're interested, it sells out every year, but there might still be space. So we can put a link for that. I'm also doing prison work with the Mind Body Awareness Project, which is something we've just celebrated 20 years

of that last year. That's teaching in all kinds of incarcerated populations and in schools and many, many places that we're bringing practices like mindfulness and social social emotional intelligence into these people that may have never heard that message. I do a Friday night group on June and that's been, we celebrated 20 years to share too. Every Friday night and we do it in person one Friday, the first Friday of the month

in San Francisco. So if people are in the Bay area, they can come sit with us. We just got a new spot. It's in Petrero Hill. Very exciting for us. And if I want to sign up for that, where do I do that? You don't have to sign up. You can just come on my, our sangha is called Big Heart City.

And so if you just get on the Big Heart City meditation page, there's a Zoom link for the Friday night, and there's recordings for the last few years since we've been doing it online. That only happened because of COVID. I never liked to have myself recorded. How am I gonna record something when we have people like Joseph Goldstein

laying the Dharma down? It's like, look, bro, I'm gonna hang back here, dude people like Joseph Goldstein laying the Dharma down. It's like, look bro, I'm gonna hang back here, dude. I'm gonna throw mine out. Hot off the press, Vinny for real. That marketing shit is not me, you know what I mean? And then the time came where it was like, yo, we actually can't get together and we have to do it online. And it was like, okay, wild concept. What if it wasn't about me just for like a second?

And then I could see like, holy shit, man, this thing has a life of its own. Last Friday, it was like over 200 people. I thought maybe when COVID ended, it would end. I guess like, oh, people still doing it. But there's people from all over that connect with our Sangha. And I'm grateful that we have this technology because yeah, it's not the same in person. But if we don't compare it to that, great benefit of being able to have accessibility

for people in all kinds of conditions. Well, speaking selfishly, I hope you have many years left to live. Back at you, bro. Yeah, man, thank you. Thank you for the service and thanks for inviting me back man you're not rid of me yet you're gonna you don't have to accept but you're gonna be invited back many times so thank you for doing this

and I'm gonna push you bro DJ didn't do the air to live for you bro you don't know what you're doing with this body we got got a spot. All right. Car Blanche, bro. You got the backstage laminate, man. Thank you, Vinny. Good to be with you, bro. Thanks again to Vinny. Love having him on. His website is vinnyferraro.org. I'll put a link in the show notes. If you go to his website,

you can keep up with all of his public teachings, including something he's doing at Spirit Rock, Young Adult Retreat, that's coming up in August. You can visit spiritrock.org for more information. I'll put that link in the show notes, and I'll put a link to the year to live course if you wanna check out the details there. While I'm at it, we've also got a special offer

for 10% happier listeners. You can get 10% off two of January's Spirit Rock events with the code 10% T-E-N-P-E-R-C-E-N-T, all spelled out. Those two courses are Cultivating the Beautiful Factors of Mind, which is an in-person event at Spirit Rock in California in late January. The other is an online event called Anxiety as Teacher, a Dharma and Yoga Day Long. I'll put the links to those courses in the show notes as well, we're gonna have a crowded show notes today.

Again, the code is 10%, T-E-N-P-E-R-C-E-N-T for 10% off. In closing, I just wanna say again, happy new year. And I also wanna thank everybody who works so hard on this show. Our producers are Tara Anderson, Caroline Keenan, and Eleanor Vasili. Our recording and engineering is handled by the great folks over at Pod People. Lauren Smith is our production manager. Marissa Schneiderman is our senior producer.

DJ Cashmere is our executive producer. And Nick Thorburn of the band Islands Island's, wrote our theme. If you like 10% happier, and I hope you do, you can listen early and ad free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple podcasts. Prime members can listen ad free on Amazon Music. Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at Wondery.com slash survey.