Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris - Facing Uncertainty | Bonus Meditation with Alexis Santos

Episode Date: May 15, 2020

Discomfort with the unknown is a natural human response. This meditation will help you relax as you practice allowing the rhythm of life to unfold. Link to meditation in app: https://10percenthappier.app.link/FacingUncertaintyPod Ten Percent Happier app offer: For a limited time, we're offering a 40% discount on a year-long subscription to the app. Visit tenpercent.com/podcast40 to get your discount and get support for your meditation practice today. This promotion is only available to users without a current Ten Percent Happier app subscription. A little about Alexis Santos: https://www.alexissantos.io/ Alexis has practiced and taught Insight Meditation in both the East and West since 2001. He has been a long-time student of Sayadaw U Tejaniya (a well respected meditation teacher in Burma whose teachings have attracted a global audience), and his teaching emphasizes knowing the mind through a natural and relaxed continuity - a style of practice that's particularly useful during our crazy lives. Alexis has completed the Spirit Rock/IMS Teacher Training, teaches retreats across the globe, and currently lives in Portland, Maine. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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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. From ABC, this is the 10% happier podcast. I'm Dan Harris. Hey guys, it's Friday so we're dropping bonus meditation. I think it's fair to say one of the defining characteristics of the times in which we live, given that we're in the middle of a pandemic is uncertainty, and that is a very uncomfortable situation for human beings. So in this meditation, the great Alexis Santos, one of the regular teachers on the

10% happier app, offers some guidance on working with the discomfort of not knowing. So here is Alexis Santos. Hi, this is Alexis. There's an old saying, you can't stop the ways from coming, but you can learn to surf. Life just keeps happening. As we grow in awareness and wisdom, we can see that a greater ease in freedom can come not from resisting circumstances, but from relaxing this tendency and allowing the rhythm of life to unfold. As we learn to trust ourselves, we can find ease in the midst of uncertainty.

Let's get started. Settle into a posture that feels comfortable to you. Sitting or lying down. Generally allow your eyes to close if you like. Take this time to simply begin to settle in to your own being. Bring awareness to what it feels like to be you right now, in your body and in your mind. Begin to notice what is present for you. You might take a couple of deeper breaths, feeling the breath as it comes in and letting it go on the out breath, and again breathing in, end out, and allow the breath to return to its natural rhythm. Allow the body to relax, softening any obvious tensions in the shoulders, softening the face, in a sense of ease. The practice of mindfulness is to recognize, to be aware of the present moment as it is.

It can be as simple as to sit and know that you're sitting. In this way, you're supporting and strengthening your awareness in each moment of recognizing your posture or breath. When we are aware, we're able to know our state of mind, and we can learn about our habitual reactions that may not serve us so well. The reactions of fear and anxiety, worry and the tendency to control. One of the biggest triggers of these habitual reactions is uncertainty. We don't know when our next sickness or misfortune will happen. If we'll lose our partner or our job, how our kids or parents will do today. On a larger scale, there's so much uncertainty about how the world and the climate are going

to turn out. Uncertainty is a part of this world, just as change is a part of this world. Moment to moment, the world is changing, but if we just do the right thing, say the right thing, or try to control enough, things will all work out. They may, but it's not because of our habits of fear or anxiety, or even our efforts to control life. Things happen when all the conditions are in place. As you continue being aware, consider for a moment that uncertainty is a natural part of life. Think of something you are currently facing where there is some uncertainty. At work, with your friends or family, take a moment to rest in the uncertainty of how things will turn out.

Being with uncertainty often calls for courage because it frequently stirs up the challenging emotions of anxiety and worry, fear or need to control. And it also calls for patience. We can simply notice what's present. We can turn towards anxiety, towards fear. We can even recognize the resistance to these feelings. Take some time now to see if you can turn towards any tightening up or contraction that might be present with a sense of curiosity, not to fix or change it, but to be aware of it, to receive it with

interest. And Uncertainty often triggers us to think about what might happen, all the things that could go wrong. It's about a future moment, maybe even one just around the corner. But what is actually happening in the moment is that fear and worry have arisen. And it's these feelings that we usually find uncomfortable about uncertainty. When we open to the feelings that uncertainty triggers, uncertainty is just a not knowing, a loosening of the fear of the doubt opening to the worry that uncertainty triggers.

Are these okay to feel knowing that being aware of these emotions is different than being caught in them. As you move into the rest of your day, see if you can find moments when uncertainty triggers a need for control, or when fear and anxiety take over. Identifying these patterns allows us to shift from fearing uncertainty to recognizing the mystery of this life just as it is. When you're ready, you can open your eyes if they have been closed and begin to orient to the space around you. Good to be with you and thank you for your practice. Thank you, Alexis.

And just a quick note. If you enjoyed this meditation, you can find it and many more meditations and talks and video-based courses and coaches who can answer your questions, all of that on the 10% happier app. And by the way, speaking of the app, given how valuable meditation is right now in these really difficult times, we're offering a special discount, so 40% off. If you want to get the app right now, if you want to get a subscription, that's for a year-long subscription, Go to 10%.com slash podcast 40. That's 10% one word all spelled out.com slash podcast 40. And of course, if you are somebody who works in food delivery or in a grocery store or

in education or in healthcare, and that's any level of healthcare from cleaning the rooms to being a nurse to being a doctor to working in a administration. If any of that describes you just go to 10% dot com slash care to get the app for free. Have a great weekend everybody will see you back here on Monday. Hey, hey, prime members, you can listen to 10% happier early and add free on Amazon music. Download the Amazon Music app today, or you can listen early and add free with Wondery Plus in Apple podcasts. Before you go, do us a solid and tell us all about yourself by completing a short survey at Wondery.com slash survey. Celebrity feuds are high stakes.

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