Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris - Flipping the Stress Switch | Bonus Meditation with Jeff Warren

Episode Date: November 20, 2020

Release the grip of stress by playing with perspective, zooming in and waaay out, and feeling into the wild weather patterns of life.   We hope you enjoyed this meditation. If you're thinkin...g, "You know, I could've kept going for another five or ten minutes," I encourage you to check out the Ten Percent Happier app, where you'll find this same meditation in different lengths to suit your practice. Your subscription cost directly supports our wonderful teachers and allows them to dedicate their time to teaching the life-changing skill of mindfulness. As an added incentive, we've got a special discount for anyone new to the app. To claim your discount, visit tenpercent.com/bonus. If you're an existing subscriber, we thank you for your support.   About Jeff Warren: Jeff is an incredibly gifted meditation teacher. He's trained in multiple traditions, including with renowned teacher Shinzen Young. Jeff is the co-author of NY Times Bestseller "Meditation for Fidgety Skeptics," and the founder of the Consciousness Explorers Club, a meditation adventure group in Toronto. He has a knack for surfacing the exact meditation that will help everyone he meets. "I have a meditation for that" is regularly heard from Jeff, so we've dubbed him the "Meditation MacGyver." 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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Starting point is 00:00:00 What does it even mean to live a good life? Is it about happiness, purpose, love, health, or wealth? What really matters in the pursuit of a life well lived? These are the questions award-winning author, founder, and interviewer Jonathan Fields asks his guests on the Top Ranked Good Life Project podcast. Every week, Jonathan sits down with world renowned thinkers and doers, people like Glenn and Doyle, Adam Grant,
Starting point is 00:00:23 Young Pueblo, Jonathan Height, and hundreds more. Start listening right now. Look for the Good Life Project on your favorite podcast app. Hey y'all, it's your girl, Kiki Palmer. I'm an actress, singer, and entrepreneur. On my 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.
Starting point is 00:00:44 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, hey, it's Friday, so it's bonus time. And today we are dropping a meditation from the inimitable Jeff Warren, a great guy and a great meditation teacher with a timely meditation about stress. That said, here we go, over to Jeff. Hi, I'm Jeff. So when I was a little kid, when I'd get stressed out about something,
Starting point is 00:01:31 my mom would sit me down and go, yeah, but honey, think about all the people having problems in other parts of the world. It made me feel both less alone, and that my problems were more manageable. So this meditation is dedicated to the wisdom of my mom. It's about getting perspective around stress, first by changing how we experience stress in our bodies, and then by seeing if we can connect it to a larger perspective. So, let's go. The eyes can be open or closed.
Starting point is 00:02:06 We start by taking a few deep breaths. So you're stretching up on the inhale. And then on the exhale, that's kind of the downward motion, the relaxing, the softening. So a nice long out breath. As you do this, just imagine you can breathe Okay, good. So this first part of the practice is about exploring how we experience stress in our own body minds. So notice where you're experiencing stress right now. How do you know your stress? What are the telltale signs in your body? How is stress coming up for you right now? Do a little survey. Okay. So now we're going to do this move. We're going to try to do this 180 turn here and try to reframe the way we experience this.
Starting point is 00:03:54 We call all of this stress, but really that's just a word. It's an idea. Before any idea of stress. There's just sensations. The question is, can you begin to experience what was once stress that has just different sensations happening and flowing? Sensation connected to other sensations, all of them slowly changing. You are like a weather pattern. So seeing if we can experience ourselves as this swirling pattern of sensations. Obviously, our problems are real, but we also have the capacity to put them in perspective. To see them as part of this larger story. Okay, relaxing here. Just chillin' out here on our cosmic stoop. Nice, long exhale, just being in your body.
Starting point is 00:06:11 When you're ready, you can open your eyes if they were closed. And notice how you feel now, versus when you begin. Nice to hang out with you. This is your local weather system, Jeff, disappearing back into the cosmic flow. Jeffrey, thank you very much. We hope you enjoyed this meditation. If you're thinking, you know, I could have kept going there for another five or 10 minutes. I encourage you to check out the 10% happier app
Starting point is 00:06:35 where you'll find this very same meditation in different lengths. The cost of your subscription directly supports are many amazing teachers and allows them to dedicate their lives to teaching the life-changing skill of mindfulness. As an added incentive, we've got a special discount for anyone new to the app to claim your discount. Visit 10% dot com slash bonus.
Starting point is 00:07:00 That's 10% one word all spelled out dot com slash bonus. If you're an existing subscriber, thank you. That does it for today. We'll see you're here on Monday with a fresh episode. 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
Starting point is 00:07:34 by completing a short survey at Wondery.com slash survey. Like this short, and it's full of a lot of interesting questions. What does happiness really mean? How do I get the most out of my time here on Earth? And what really is the best cereal? These are the questions I seek to resolve on my weekly podcast, Life is short with just and long. If you're looking for the answer to deep philosophical questions like, what is the meaning of life?
Starting point is 00:08:01 I can't really help you, but I do believe that we really enrich our experience here by learning from others. And that's why in each episode, I like to talk with actors, musicians, artists, scientists, and many more types of people about how they get the most out of life. We explore how they felt during the highs and sometimes more importantly, the lows of their careers.
Starting point is 00:08:23 We discuss how they've been able to stay happy during some of the harder times, but if I'm being honest, it's mostly just fun chats between friends about the important stuff. Like if you had a sandwich named after you, what would be on it? Follow Life is short wherever you get your podcasts. You can also listen to Add Free on the Amazon Music
Starting point is 00:08:40 or Wondering App. or wonder yeah.

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